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Comment by Neywiny | Hacker News Reader

We play a dangerous game with science communication. When it was just "global warming" it almost worked to scare the public into behaving but then people went "yeah but look, it's cold outside". There are still a lot of people who view climate change (and really that's a very soft term, doesn't convey urgency) as a waste of money. By showing how much it costs they can try to mitigate that. But, as you point out, your numbers need to be bulletproof. Otherwise those climate deniers will go "but inflation"

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If homo sapiens is to survive, we had better have the capacity to see the truth even if sometimes the messenger of that truth falls to human faults, like exaggeration or even straight lies.

That's just how things are. If we depend on the side that warns us of climate change to never make a mistake or an intentional wrong, we're cooked. Because that side is human as are all sides of all arguments.

Maybe we are cooked. That's how it looks to this clueless person.

We're not homo sapiens at this point. We're homo consumens. We're addicted to the thing that drives climate change.

We might be able to stop it if we killed advertising. And social media.

Look at the term you used when you discuss science communication:

> it almost worked to scare the public into behaving

That obviously isn't the point of science, and when you make it the point of science, people quite rationally stop trusting it.

The International Panel on Climate Change was started in 1988. We've been calling it climate change since before most people heard of global warming.

Deniers will complain about any name you give it.

Some "deniers" aren't "deniers". They're tired of the scare tactic headlines, politics, and fatalistic language.

When you call them "deniers", you push them even further away. You've gone from being mildly annoying to name-calling.

This applies to other subjects as well - masks, LGBT politics, social equality, etc.

Name-calling turns potential allies into entrenched enemies, yet some proponents for change double down on this tactic which further erodes their goal of winning people to their side.

The past 20 years have proven out pretty basic math: when you multiply a bimodal distribution by a constant > 1 you still have two modes but the peaks are farther apart. The deviation is that in our case the peaks are actually higher than before.

They aren't potential allies. They are fully entrenched, and I won't be gaslit into pretending that's my fault. Not will I waste time on the lie that they'll come around if only I suck up to them. I will call them the name they have earned.

This is the same problem the Democratic party has when some fringe members of the party essentially say, "fuck you, vote for me." It poisons the well.

It doesn't matter that the well-meaning people within the party are always on their best behavior and are making every attempt to be inclusive. A few bad eggs ruins the perception of the entire batch.

This is militant and excludes people. It's also really self-serving. You get to feel good about yourself while simultaneously pushing people away.

This is a massive problem with social media.

That's the thing. I'm not a militant left winger. I'm part of the Democratic mainstream that the left wingers call right wing, and they're probably correct. I'd be considered center-right in most European countries. I am very angry at that segment of the left who won't vote for Democrats and instead leave us with literal fascists.

And yet they are still more likely allies than Republican "centrists". They just voted for a felon and an insurrectionist. They knew that he was incompetent, stupid, and deliberately hostile. They voted for him because he's not the Democrat.

I will not be able to change their minds. Any candidate I vote for will always be their enemy. They're not just waiting for a kind word from me to put that hostility behind them and be nice centrist friends.

The Democratic party still has not accepted that. And they will continue to lose.

One side has to argue in good faith and be correct 100% of the time, while the other side can lie with impunity. Is it any surprise who wins the debate?

Nobody is 100% right or 100% wrong. There is no "side" that talks about the size of the world population, and the fact that the scientific advances are the reason for the ability of entire human race to exhaust available resources. There is also no "side" that ranks the global climate change truly globally, and focuses on top priorities. There are no global "sides". There are only people. People do care, but people also don't want to make hard choices. Finger pointing is just too easy.

There absolutely are sides in an argument however, which is what they are talking about.

I don't believe any climate change "skeptic" has ever been swayed by "bulletproof" numbers and arguments. Well, not for the last fifty years at least. This disbelief in a fundamental truth of our times wasn't birthed in rationality and won't be cured by it.

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