Yet more Republicans in denial (about climate change)

[Pale Blue Dot]

The latest Pew survey on Americans' attitudes toward the climate crisis is so depressing, I am reminded of that old Busby Meyers song, "What's the use of getting sober, when you're gonna get drunk again?" I mean, really. Why bother? But because the only alternative to carrying on is to not carry on, here's my attempt at giving the numbers a positive spin.

The Pew study found that "he proportion of Americans who say that the earth is getting warmer has decreased modestly since January 2007, mostly because of a decline among Republicans." Since January, the percentage who recognize reality has dropped from 77 to 71. Not a huge drop, and I suspect that the lion's share of the drop can be attributed to all the miserable winter weather that blasted major urban centers in just about every region.

Of course, it's silly to change one's mind about long-term trends because of a few weeks of contrary temperatures, but humans are not programmed to respond to long-term abstract threats. Still, that doesn't explain the difference in the changes according to party preference. Democrats fell just two points, from 86 to 84, while the percentage of Republicans who acknowledge what climatologists are telling us fell almost seven times as much, from 62 to 49. Yikes. Fewer than half of those who aren't embarrassed enough by the current president's record to hide their party affiliation believe the bloody obvious.

The really interesting bit involves the educational background of the GOP respondents. This isn't the first time the relationship has come to light, but it's probably significant enough that we should be paying attention.

Among Republicans, similar percentages of college graduates and those with less education say there is solid evidence of global warming (46% and 51%, respectively). Yet for Republicans, unlike Democrats, higher education is associated with greater skepticism that human activity is causing global warming. Only 19% of Republican college graduates say that there is solid evidence that the earth is warming and it is caused by human activity, while 31% of Republicans with less education say the same.

Essentially, it seems to be saying that the more Republicans know, the more gullible they become to pseudoskeptical arguments about climate change. Now why would that be?

There must be some other factor involved. For example, more educated Republicans are probably richer, and therefore more likely to believe that the status quo is good, and therefore less skeptical of the propaganda that tells them not to worry about whatever it is the climatologists are on about. At least, that's one theory. But it doesn't explain why among the Democrats, the opposite is the case: "Fully 75% of Democrats with college degrees say that the earth is warming and that this is caused by human activity. Just 52% of Democrats with less education express this view."

http://scienceblogs.com/islandofdoubt/2008/05/yet_more_republicans_in_denial.php

[Juche]

1. Republicans also reject evolution

Fundamentally, so what? Does it matter if GOP members believe in global warming? Will it change the effort places like Europe, China or India have to put into fixing it? Not only that, but the government is shifting hands to the dems, so the dems can still pass laws to promote addressing climate change.

[Lasher]

2. Hell, they're in denial about being Republicans.

They say they're libertarians or free thinking independents. And it's retroactive too. They've never been Republicans, ya know, even though the only time they ever voted for anyone but a Republican was when Ross Perot ran.

[jwirr]

3. pugs are skeptical because they are taught to reject anything that

is not literal bible. Home schooling for religious purposes is often the cause. Also they tend to limit their sources of information to rw media only. They are not looking for truth they are waiting to be told what to believe.

[Ian David]

4. They're not IN denial.. they're DENIERS. They know damn well what the truth is.

They just ignore and DENY it.

Some of them do so because they believe Jesus will come and take them to Heaven soon.

Maybe they know something about Bush's exit strategy that we don't?