Re:On Behalf of Environmentalists, I Apologize for the Clima...
by pmiller2 on Tuesday June 30, 2020 @07:28PM
(#23696015)
What would you accept as evidence of a "broad scientific consensus" that climate change "would have massive effects on human civilization"? It's not 84% like the number you cite who believe humans contribute, but the 41% figure you cite does tell me that roughly 1 in 2 climate scientists think we're doomed if we do nothing. I would call that a broad consensus, given that a huge majority believe there will be at least a "moderate" effect on human civilization.
Incidentally, why are the choices "catastrophic effect," "moderate effect," "relatively little danger," and "humans aren't contributing to climate change, anyway?" Why is there nothing in between "moderate" and "catastrophic" effect? That seems a little suspect to me.
Edit: Here's an oldish article: "Climate Scientists Agree on Warming, Disagree on Dangers, and Don’t Trust the Media’s Coverage of Climate Change" https://web.archive.org/web/20100111104946/http://stats.org/...
Edit 2: "In 2007, Harris Interactive surveyed 489 randomly selected members of either the American Meteorological Society or the American Geophysical Union for the Statistical Assessment Service (STATS) at George Mason University. 97% of the scientists surveyed agreed that global temperatures had increased during the past 100 years; 84% said they personally believed human-induced warming was occurring, and 74% agreed that "currently available scientific evidence" substantiated its occurrence. Catastrophic effects in 50–100 years would likely be observed according to 41%, while 44% thought the effects would be moderate and about 13 percent saw relatively little danger. 5% said they thought human activity did not contribute to greenhouse warming." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_consensus_on_climat... (Edit²: emphasis added)