Four stories on belief: from the allure of cults and conspiracy theories, to the effect of trauma on faith, to the way dogma has influenced science – and if technology can actually shift our beliefs.
Galileo was right, but that doesn’t mean his fans are.
Justus Sustermans/Wikimedia Commons
One Nation Senator-elect Malcolm Roberts lauds Galileo as a hero who turned scientific consensus on its head. But the ‘Galileo gambit’ is just one weapon in the climate conspiracists’ arsenal.
This is the second article in a series, How we make decisions, which explores our decision-making processes. How well do we consider all factors involved in a decision, and what helps and what holds us…
Science can’t tell us exactly when the rising oceans will swallow up the Maldives, but it can give us a good idea.
Hiroyuki-H
Former environment minister Owen Paterson has called for the UK to scrap its climate change targets. In a speech to the Global Warming Policy Foundation, he cited “considerable uncertainty” over the impact…
Stephan Lewandowsky, chair of cognitive psychology at the University of Bristol, answered questions posed by the public on Reddit. The Conversation has curated the highlights. Conspiracy theories Under…
Smoking: bad for pretty much everything.
SlapAyoda
What’s the best way to reduce the roughly half a million annual deaths from smoking in the US alone? Nearly half a million lives cut short, often with untold suffering, by a commercial product that has…
Clearing snow for a helicopter rescue makes for a dramatic photo, but let’s not forget the science.
EPA/Andrew Peacock/Footloosefotography/spritiofmawson.com
As the saying goes, a picture is worth a thousand words, and by now you might have seen dramatic images of passengers on stranded icebreaker Akademik Shokalskiy being rescued by helicopter last Friday…
The sky is falling! Oh wait, no: it’s just the clouds moving…
Sarah Smith
Several Australian corporate figures have recently disparaged climate scientists. First, former banker David Murray questioned the integrity of climate scientists on national TV. Casting such aspersions…
It doesn’t matter how much evidence you have, people have already made up their mind about science.
Flickr/blakeimeson
You’d be forgiven for thinking science is under attack. Climate science has been challenged by deniers and sceptics, vaccination rates are falling thanks to anti-vaccination movements, and GM crops are…
Framing with disaster may not be the best option.
Lone Primate
How does newspaper coverage affect how we view climate change? A new report has estimated that 82% of articles about climate change are framed in the context of “disaster” and “uncertainty”. The report’s…
To whom does one complain about the PCC?
Yui Mok/PA
Free speech does not imply the freedom to mislead. We want our media to be free, but also honest and reliable. Balancing those sometimes competing demands is a subtle and difficult task. In many countries…
Sometimes even the clearest signs of change are ignored.
Flickr/baldeaglebluff
When President Obama last week tweeted that “97% of scientists agree: climate change is real, man-made, and dangerous” it drew the attention of his 31 million followers to the most recent study pointing…
Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC), which says it regrets the leak of it’s latest major report.
AAP Image/Paul Miller
A leaked draft report by the world’s top climate scientists has found that is virtually certain that humans are causing climate change but parts of it have been wildly misinterpreted by climate change…
Want to know what’s going on with the atmosphere? Ask the American Geophysical Union.
Jim Nix
The latest climate talks in Doha are unlikely to yield a breakthrough. Instead, the can will most likely be kicked further down the road, at considerable future cost. The Doha negotiations coincide with…
Ignoring climate change isn’t stupidity, it’s ideology.
Peter Foley/EPA
“It’s global warming, stupid” – Bloomberg’s Businessweek cover last week left little doubt about their opinion concerning “Frankenstorm” Sandy. The accompanying tweet anticipated that the cover might “generate…
Although most experts agree that CO2 emissions are causing anthropogenic global warming, public concern has been declining, the study said.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/kimjphotography
People are more likely to believe that humans cause global warming if they are told that 97% of publishing climate scientists agree that it does, a new study has found. Despite overwhelming evidence showing…
If health ministers want to keep people out of here they should be supporting - not opposing - action on climate change.
Dan Cox
The ACCC has been vigilant about following up the 45 or so carbon price gouging complaints it gets each day. But who can stop the politicians? Their relentless carbon price scare campaigns seek to frighten…
Gina Rinehart’s involvement in Fairfax is unlikely to alleviate an already polarised and fragmented media discourse in Australia.
AAP
There are numerous indications that mining magnate Gina Rinehart seeks to take control of the Fairfax media group. What are the likely implications of that move, and how would it affect Australian society…
What’s next, Hitler was a vegetarian?
Heartland Institute
The inversion of reality and morality has been a long-standing attribute of the climate “debate,” which reached a new watershed low a few days ago with the latest travesty from the Heartland Institute…
Philosophers talk about the “dirty hands” problem: are lies OK in the pursuit of truth?
Le Mast/Flickr
“Truth is so precious that she should be attended by a bodyguard of lies.” Winston Churchill’s famous words were uttered during the war against the Nazis and referred to Operation Bodyguard, a deception…
It can be hard to sort fact from fiction in the modern media environment.
Mike Bailey-Gates
A growing cohort of commentators has bemoaned the descent of contemporary political “debate” into a largely fact-free zone. People used to be entitled to their own opinions, but not their own set of facts…
You can’t believe everything you read in the papers … but you probably will.
EPA/Ian Nicholson
So The Guardian has now retracted its earlier reports that News of the World journalists had deleted Milly Dowler’s voicemails. Those journalists hacked the dead girl’s phone but they may not have deleted…
