While I do not know what the overall effects of this sort of thing are, I will note the question in question got no good answers, and it's possible that it could have gotten one or more had everyone read the question the way it was conceived. So I consider that a small net loss. Generalizing, one might say that any question that did not have one obvious good, solid, scientifically correct answer is a small net loss, because it cedes the field to idiocy by default.
Personally, I have been labelled an "alarmist" because I believe that the prudent path is to consider the worst case scenario a possibility. The worst that could happen because of such a position, provided that it is tempered with reason rather than fear, would be a few too many wind turbines, solar panels and nuclear power plants and too much oil and coal left in the ground. That does not mean that I am not open to other positions. If I were a betting person, I would actually put money on Roy Spencer winning the Noble Prize, because, the small chance that global warming may be wrong is higher than any "warmist" scientist making a major breakthrough.
And, no, I don't think that Richard Lindzen will win the Nobel Prize, because high level clouds are not behaving in a manner consistent with his Iris hypothesis. But in general, clouds are showing a negative correlation with temperature, which is consistent with clouds being a positive feedback, but also consistent with them being a forcing, as proposed by Roy Spencer.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/global-warmi...
So, what does this have to do with your question. There is always the risk that someone by read such statements about Roy Spencer out of context and label me as a denier.
Yeah the guy who uses the phrase DA deniers is a known regular here who regularly spouts political propaganda and anti science rhetoric. He finds it difficult to make any meaningful contributions so he just abuses and invented his 50's haircut holocaust denier slur, although in his world the DA isn't a haircut it apparently stands for dumb ***. He is the inspiration for my LT alarmist label, I feel no need to explain what a LT alarmist is tho because agw proponents are experts in predicting the future and understanding the unexplained.
It seems that there is a general frustration with this category of Y/A and that is leading to some labeling people as deniers. In some cases, it can go back some distance in the past and relates to uninformed questions and comments made by the person so labeled quite a while ago. I'm sure in other instances it is a misreading of the question or a feeling of 'here we go again' and a response to that feeling.
As one of the participants who comes here looking for information, links and the latest on climate change research, the disruptive behavior of others who fit the definition of 'deniers' is very frustrating and it has resulted in me actually opening the questions far less frequently because the contents are too often devoid of any useful information.
The bulk of my time here nowadays is spent being alternately entertained and disgusted by the low level of discourse and considering the relationship dynamic of the others who participate here...like this question explores.
It's really kind of sad, though, and I am less entertained by it than I have been in the past. I do not understand why people who are in denial cannot eventually get it through their heads why they are getting labeled as such. In some cases they have made it clear that they consider the label some sort of badge of honor when their denial is so clearly rooted in ignorance.
And that is a final factor; there are plenty of things in climate science to be skeptical about and I think the people who are most disruptive are interfering with the discussion of the issues we should be skeptical about. They've paralyzed things, like in the political arena of the U.S. that has lead to the shutdown. Although they want to blame others for the paralysis and name-calling both there and here, it isn't a chicken and egg situation, it is cause and effect. Some people are reacting emotionally to it now by calling others the nastiest names they can think of. Here, for example, legitimate skeptics are called sometimes called deniers...and in politics, reasonable people are sometimes mistakenly called Republicans.
They wish to silence skeptics and scare away others from skeptical arguments by painting them as similar to Holocaust deniers. Attacking the enemy is the goal.
Hmm I was wondering that too, I often ask genuine questions and want to know the answers, but I usually don't get a real answer, the answers usually go off at a tangent to something else along with the usually abuse.
The question before this one from me is that kind of questionhttp://ph.answers.yahoo.com/question/ind...
I don't know what you are talking about specifically but there are many alarmists (probably most) who have a religious like belief in their cause. That is why I often refer to them as cultists. You apparently noticed some of that behavior as well.
For some it isn't about searching for the truth or doing what is right, they already know the truth and have been told what right is and nothing in heaven and earth is going to sway them. It is not uniquely liberal but ever wonder why black conservatives get labeled as uncle Tom's? Want a liberal to change their mind about something; get a conservative to agree with them.
There is more than one kind of anti-science denial involved here. Arguably the most egregious form has been committed many years ago by a miniscule renegade fraction of highly accomplished senior scientists who decided for whatever set of reasons that scientific truth had to take second place to an ideological or psychological agenda that they had. You can read more than you might want to know about these guys in Oreskes and Conway's Merchants of Doubt. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchants_o... Most of their key arguments were formulated in the 1980s and early 1990s during a time when there was still enough actual scientific doubt for much or even most of what they were doing to qualify as "skepticism" rather than denial. And, they were partly motivated by what they saw (mostly but not entirely unjustifiably) as a politicization of science by an even smaller number of scientists (who these early denier/skeptics falsely portrayed as mainstream) but in reality much more by journalists and few politicians, who exaggerated and sensationalized the early findings of climate science. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_cha... This is the 1% historic shred of truth in the claim that climate science HAD (more than now has) an "alarmist" dimension.
But you have to call people like Seitz, Singer, and Lindzen deniers, because they have almost NEVER even acknowledged since, that most of what they wrote in the 1980s and 1990s (mostly NOT in peer-reviewed literature of course, speaking of "politicizing") has been demolished and rubbished by climate science.
Nor can I recall any of them owning up to be funded by fossil fuel interests (and in some cases earlier by tobacco companies, funding denial of the scientific evidence for its harmful medical effects). http://www.newsweek.com/2007/08/13/the-t... Indeed, they are happy to sit back and watch as a small army of con artists, and corrupt politicians http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Inhofe and a much larger contingent of dupes who endlessly recycle the "skeptical" critiques they published decades ago for the likes of Marshall Institute.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_C._M...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heartla...
http://www.desmogblog.com/global-warming...
Now all of that is background to what is going on here. The deniers here (to Yahoo's utter shame, they occupy HALF of the top ten list of best answers in the category) are not professional scientists or even professional anti-scientists. They are 3rd and 4th hand copiers, recycling the endless contradictory mythology extensively cataloged on ://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php and long since debunked (some of which myths had shreds of skeptical credibility when created in the 1980s, but in all but a few cases zero credibility now). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Wat...
Some of these hard-core anti-science posters here at YA have developed a knack for cloaking their denial. They sometimes post innocuous-looking questions, and more rarely actually perfectly legitimate questions. In those rare cases it is not strictly speaking inaccurate to call them deniers, because the overwhelming bulk of their posts ARE posts based on denial of science (and even many of their rare non-denial Qs and As) are demonstrably posted NOT for the purpose of actually learning the truth, but in order to gain just enough info to be able to less blatantly deceive with future denying posts.
Then there is a much larger group here that is either flirting with denial, and occasionally resorting to it (perhaps subconsciously) by repeating what they heard at a bar, or on a "tea party" blog, or an anti-science blog like Wattsup or an anti-science book like Crichton's pulp science fiction http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/arc... that tried to masquerade as science There one should probably refrain from calling the posters (as individuals) deniers, which however, in no way invalidates referring to their questions and answers (as posts) as denying science.
A final group, usually but not always clearly distinguishable from the opportunistic posters of denial mentioned just above, consists of people who are genuinely uninformed and genuinely looking for factual information. They are not deniers, and should not be termed such, at least not as long as they post factual and objective Qs and As.
There is a TON of evidence for this in the archived ("resolved") questions. Trevor was keeping tabs on some of it.
Recently, someone asked "How is the accumulation of heat energy in the ocean good for us?", with details about, essentially, a ratcheting pattern in surface temperatures from the PDO alternately absorbing and releasing heat.
One of the answers started with "Where do you DA deniers keep getting all this Earth cooling crap." Neither the original asker nor anyone else who had yet answered had said anything about global cooling, though the asker did mention the PDO being in a cool phase.
And it's not the first time I've seen a realist or a legitimate knowledge seeker accused of being a denier for saying something that could, possibly, be viewed as a denialist or skeptic position if you squint hard enough--a hypothetical question, a genuine request for an explanation, and so on.
What's the deal there? Is it just sloppy reading on the part of Certain Parties (I think it's the same person or 2-3 people doing this)? Is it that they're so worried about appearing to in any way support denialist stupidity that they feel anything remotely close to same must be attacked with fire? Or is there something else going on here? And does this kind of thing help, hurt, or have no particular effect on efforts to shine light into the thicker skulls around here?
