From the Pew Research Center:
Views about the existence and causes of global warming have changed little over the past year. A new Pew Research Center poll finds that 59% of adults say there is solid evidence that the earth’s average temperature has been getting warmer over the past few decades. In October 2009, 57% said this.
Roughly a third (34%) say that global warming is occurring mostly because of human activity, such as the burning of fossil fuels, which also is little changed from last year (36%).
The latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, conducted Oct. 13-18 among 2,251 adults reached on landlines and cell phones, finds that 32% say global warming is a very serious problem while 31% think it is somewhat serious. A year ago, 35% described global warming as a very serious problem and 30% said it was somewhat serious.
In 2006, far more Americans said there was solid evidence that the average temperature has been rising over the past few decades. In July of that year, 79% believed there was evidence of global warming, and half (50%) said it was mostly caused by human activity. Much of the change in attitudes about global warming occurred between April 2008 and last fall, with the decline coming mostly, though not entirely, among Republicans and independents. (See “Fewer Americans See Solid Evidence of Global Warming,” Oct. 22, 2009).
Two other indicators of opinion on the issue were not included in the October 2009 survey, and both show significant changes from earlier polls. Currently, 46% of the public says global warming is a problem that requires immediate government action. In July 2006, 61% said the issue needed immediate action. This decline is mostly a consequence of the fact that fewer now say global warming is a problem.
The public is divided on the question of whether scientists themselves agree that the earth is warming because of human activity: 44% say scientists agree, and 44% say they do not. In July 2006, when a much higher percentage of the public said there was solid evidence of global warming, 59% said that scientists agree that global warming is caused by humans, while just 29% said scientists do not agree.
The new survey finds continuing support for a range of policies to address the nation’s energy supply, including requiring improved vehicle fuel efficiency and increasing federal funding for research on wind, solar and hydrogen technology. Support for allowing more offshore oil and gas drilling – which declined during the Gulf of Mexico oil leak – has rebounded modestly. Currently, 51% favor allowing more offshore oil and gas drilling, up from 44% in June.
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Read the complete report here
Caveat: some of the usual suspects will complain that the graph I presented has “bias” due to it showing only the range of change in the data on the Y axis, and not the full possible range.
If lodging such a complaint, please consider lodging a complaint about the Y axis of these graphs also:
Sea Ice, Sea Level, Temperature rise
Thank you for your consideration – Anthony
Interesting to see how the CAGW meme is in rapid decline.
Only a couple of years ago I was one of only two sceptics, out of our small circle of 23 friends. Currently we have been joined by new converts and now only three die-hard believers remain.
I find it reassuring that despite the billions of dollars spent on this scam, more and more of the public have the common sense to see through the lie.
Check out these threads by Roy Spencer
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/28/congratulations-finally-to-spencer-and-braswell-on-getting-their-new-paper-published/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/09/14/spencer-on-water-vapor-feedback/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/10/21/spencer-on-lacis-nasa-giss-co2-paper/
I doubt that any thinking person would seriously doubt that CO2 is a “greenhouse gas” whose effect is logarithmic. The real question is how trivial will be its effect if it increases somewhat until fusion power (or something similar) can be harnessed in the perhaps distant future? From the current already fairly high level of CO2, if the level rises even 10%, its logarithmic “greenhouse effect” will be trivial when such possible effect is compared to the enormous variations in Earth’s temperature that have occurred over millions of years due to unknown other causes, possibly related to our Sun?
I think if you could determine party political support you’d find the ‘yes’ and ‘no’ sides completely polarised.
Here is a similar poll result from Oz which has party support included. In Oz, Labor and Green parties are of the Left, and Liberal and National parties mostly of the Right.
On the strength of this I suspect in answer to the above question “Is is a problem requiring immediate government action” that the 46% saying yes are on the Democrat side of the spectrum, and the 47% saying No/not a problem are on the Republican side. Cats and dogs.
Owen says:
“There are certainly issues – current measurements of oceanic heat content cannot account for the total TOA energy imbalance”
You mean where is the heat? Ill tell you where the heat is Owen, it is leaving. It has been leaving ever since the Holocene optimum 8000 years ago. These are the good old days. Enjoy it while it lasts.
While public opinion certainly matters, it reflects a trickle down effect of information gathered from other sources, primarily through the media. In that context, when stifling public discourse and debate from all sides is allowed, public opinion can be and all too often is the ultimate social expression of GIGO. That is precisely why it is imperative that good, factually backed information be made available for all to see, even if that information engenders conflicting opinions. A voting citizen cannot make a prudent, informed decision without having good, hard facts and information available to them.
What I find most interesting is the percentage of scientists convinced about AGW has dropped from a pro AGW 2-1 ratio (59-29) to dead even (44-44), with 12% of scientists still undecided through the entire polling range of years. I don’t know what the parameters are to qualify as a scientist for this poll. Did they poll physicists or did they poll anyone that works in some field of science, not necessarily related to climate? Whatever the parameters may be, the drop from a pro AGW 2-1 ratio of scientists to dead even in just 4 years is remarkable.
I only know one true believer, however, he also claimed that he could see the ozone hole when he was in Antarctica.
DaveE.
Here’s an unscientific poll over at thenation.com that shows AGW only getting 7% of importance among liberals:
http://www.thenation.com/poll/which-issue-most-important-you-election-season
Owen said “…and all of this when we are at a 100-year solar minimum!
(new paragraph)
There are certainly issues – current measurements of oceanic heat content cannot account for the total TOA energy imbalance…”
Owen, presumably you are interested in OHC because you believe there is a lag from CO2 warming to atmospheric warming (with water vapor feedback) due to ocean thermal inertia. Yet you also claim that the solar minimum should show up right now with no lag and no leftover heat from the CO2 to ocean warming you believe has taken place.
B. Smith says:
October 27, 2010 at 4:06 pm
While public opinion certainly matters, it reflects a trickle down effect of information gathered from other sources, primarily through the media. In that context, when stifling public discourse and debate from all sides is allowed, public opinion can be and all too often is the ultimate social expression of GIGO. That is precisely why it is imperative that good, factually backed information be made available for all to see, even if that information engenders conflicting opinions. A voting citizen cannot make a prudent, informed decision without having good, hard facts and information available to them.
______
The average voter is far more pursuaded by emotional appeal than any facts you can present to them, and this is especially true when trying to present information as difficult and complex as climate science. The facts are that the climate is a very complex system, existing at the edge of chaos, with far too many complex interrelationships to be easily and truthfully explained to the public– thus, the emotional appeal wins everytime. Both “sides” in the AGW issue use emotional appeal, though each is of a different color. On the “warmist” side you have only the iconic poor polar bear stranded (via Photoshop) on the rapidly melting iceberg or the infamous hockey stick graph to get the point, and on the “skeptic” side you have the broken hockey stick and the deeper emotional appeal to the general growing distrust of big science and big government (especially internationally linked big governemnt, i.e. the IPCC). Cool and skeptical distrust is as much an emotion as the warm and fuzzy compassion sparked by the poor stranded photoshopped polar bear– they are both at root an emotional reaction and will win far more votes than any attempt to explain the science. The skeptics will use their distrust to go and find the reasons why the climate scientists are wrong or even worse, to be distrusted, (i.e. climategate) and the warmists will use their warm and fuzzy compassion to find the reasons why we need to take action and to prevent catastrophe. Those in both camps are witting or unwitting pawns of political forces on both sides, who are driven ultimately by financial concerns, and who know that successful appeals to the emotions , whether that emotion be compassion or distrust, always win the day.
In the best of all worlds, the true scientist will avoid both camps, stay far and wide of any politics, (where they will certainly be used as a tool for ends they have no control over) and simply state their findings, and even more importantly, open their data to the whole world for full review and discussion.
“”””” bob paglee says:
October 27, 2010 at 3:09 pm
I doubt that any thinking person would seriously doubt that CO2 is a “greenhouse gas” whose effect is logarithmic. “””””
Well meet the very first person you’ve ever heard of ; who does not believe that; ME !
Well I AM a thinking person; so I am a member of the polled class.
And I don’t doubt; either seriously or cavalierly; that indeed CO2 is a “greenhouse gas”.
But “” whose effect is logarithmic “” ?
Well you just lost me there. For a start; the logarithm function for positive real numbers; is a monotonic function. Argument increases; and the log function also increases; ALWAYS. You never get a behavior where at some point, when the argument increases some more; the log function goes down; that simply is not a property of the log function.
We have proxy data covering five octaves of CO2 abundance and 10 deg C of Temperature excursion for the same time frame; and there is no way you could fit that data to any sort of log function; you cannot fit it to a linear function either; and it would be impossible to prove that the best fit log function was a better fit, than the best fit linear function; and I doubt you could fit it to any polynomial function having less than ten arbitrarily fitted parameters.
We also have a more restrictive range of actual experimentally measured real data; which actually encompasses only about 0.3 octaves of CO2 abundance; and yet even with that more accurate data, and restricted range the data does not fit any monotonic function; and is no better fit to a log function than to a linear function.
So no; I don’t buy it; and I somehow don’t think I am alone there.
“”””” Owen says:
October 27, 2010 at 2:13 pm
Richard Sharpe says:
October 27, 2010 at 1:45 pm
“So tell us why H2O itself is not the mechanism?”
H2O is in the mechanism, mightily, as the most potent positive feedback in the warming process (a warming atmosphere will contain increasingly more H2O). For H2O to explain the forcing however, you would need to posit a great steam vent in the pacific (or somewhere else) that would steadily and consistently pump out water vapor. But even that would condense almost immediately. It is quite difficult to make H2O a forcing agent of climate change on its own. “””””
Why so ? Even in the very dryest desert regions on earth; some say the Atacama in Chile tops the list; while Antarctica is considered the dryest and coldest Continent; the atmospheric abundance of H2O is higher than that for CO2; so a steam vent is hardly necessary to put H2O in the atmosphere; and as everybody knows; the thermal radiation from the atmosphere carries no signature of the origin of the heating; and since the H2O feedback factor is about 4 for CO2 caused warming; and can’t possibly be difefrent for H2O caused warming sicne warming carries no signature; then H2O by itslef is quite capable of doing the whole job.
And with that big a feedback factor from initial warming to increased H2O Vapor, the system is unstable with that much positive feedback so it runs up to the stop; which happens to be the onset of powerful negative feedback from increased clouds blocking sunlight, and shutting down the original source of the energy. If you could somehow siphon off all the clouds so there was no cloud blockage of the sun or albedo contributtion from them; the earth’s oceans would simply evaporate away; driven by no more than the initial however low H2O content of the atmosphere; and it would all end up in that cloud siphon.
So nyet! on the need for any CO2 to start the exodus.
I published the comment below on Jo Nova’s site today but as Anthony is talking about consensus the comment is relevant here as well:
Did anyone see the article in the Australian Climate change sceptics lose battle as onus of proof shifts http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/legal-affairs/climate-change-sceptics-lose-battle-as-onus-of-proof-shifts/story-e6frg97x-1225941959223
It’s about the precautionary principle which I anticipate Julia Gillard will start to talk about shortly; As the article says ‘The principle appears in Article 3 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 1992. It is one of the four principles of ecologically sustainable development. Those principles have been absorbed into Australian environmental law at commonwealth and state levels since 1991.’
“the precautionary principle operates to shift the evidentiary burden of proof as to whether there is a threat of serious or irreversible environmental damage,” “Where there is a reasonably certain threat of serious or irreversible damage, the precautionary principle is not needed and is not evoked . . . “But where the threat is uncertain, past practice had been to defer taking preventative measures because of that uncertainty.’
This has been changed by the absorption into Australian law of the precautionary principle which “… operates, when activated, to create an assumption that the threat is not uncertain but rather certain. “… if there is a threat of serious or irreversible environmental damage and there is the requisite degree of scientific uncertainty, the precautionary principle will be activated.”
The author goes on to say ‘In Australia, the climate sceptics have failed. No political party is arguing that the threat does not exist or is negligible. The only argument now, in accordance with the precautionary principle, is determining what preventative measures have to be taken to reduce emissions.’
But the author fails to explore the possibility that the threat does not exist or is negligible; just because political parties are not arguing about it does not mean the threat does not exist or is negligible; I’m still firmly of the belief that a Royal Commission should be held to determine this issue for Australia;
R Gates, I can’t believe you would dismiss the people so frivolously. Have you not read that document with the preamble that begins with “We the People…”?
http://www.usconstitution.net/const.html
Anthony,m
Even more interesting are the results of the poll attached to the Judith Curry article in Scientific American — this is a poll of the alleged scientific intelligentsia of the USA — SciAm readers.
Ongoing results available at:
http://www.surveymonkey.com/sr.aspx?sm=ONSUsVTBSpkC_2f2cTnptR6w_2fehN0orSbxLH1gIA03DqU_3d
Pretty interesting. Of course, skeptic blogs may be driving traffic to the poll, skewing the results…or not. In any case, the results are shocking (?) and/or amusing.
Kip Hansen says:
October 27, 2010 at 6:40 pm
Thanks for the link! Devastating!….now…like the great George Carlin said: “Pack your sh**s folks….we are leaving!!
R. Shearer says:
October 27, 2010 at 11:15 am
“You can’t fool all of the people, all of the time.”
I am sure that’s what lemmings are thinking as they go over the cliff.
And while you all sit here blogging your beliefs, reality moves ever onward.
Val said:
“The author goes on to say ‘In Australia, the climate sceptics have failed. No political party is arguing that the threat does not exist or is negligible. The only argument now, in accordance with the precautionary principle, is determining what preventative measures have to be taken to reduce emissions.’”
Labor holds only a razor thin majority in Australia thanks in part to Kevin Rudd’s various green schemes like the insulation affair where many houses burned down. The average voter will never grasp the ‘precautionary principle’ but they do understand electricity rates which are sky rocketing because of feed in tariffs of $60 cents/kwh for solar panels. New South Wales minister has just announced she is slashing the tariff to 20 cents/kwh due to billion dollar deficit the province has now incurred.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/energy-smart/solar-rate-cut-to-stop-costs-going-through-the-roof-20101027-173y5.html
This disaster is headed for California in the near future.
I believe in global climate change. It has been changing for the past 4,500,000,000 years (or is it 6,500 years – big numbers confuse me) and it will continue to change until the end of time.
Any fool can see that it was warmer in the past than it is today. Show me a picture of Jesus, Gandhi or the Buddha with warm socks and a winter coat.
Facts is facts.
R. Gates says:
“In short, the average person really knows nothing about the science or the deeper issues involved in the AGW “debate”.”
_________________________________
And that’s the gist of the deadliest modern disease: unsubstantiated hubris.
Who, how, and on what basis, Mr. Gates, appointed you to be above average?
What have you done in your life to prove it?
You cannot even express yourself clearly in writing — but boy you are full of it!
val majkus says: October 27, 2010 at 5:50 pm
Did anyone see the article in the Australian Climate change sceptics lose battle as onus of proof It’s about the precautionary principle which I anticipate Julia Gillard will start to talk about shortly; As the article says ‘The principle appears in Article 3 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 1992. It is one of the four principles of ecologically sustainable development. Those principles have been absorbed into Australian environmental law at commonwealth and state levels since 1991.’
“the precautionary principle operates to shift the evidentiary burden of proof as to whether there is a threat of serious or irreversible environmental damage,”…. The author goes on to say ‘In Australia, the climate sceptics have failed.
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This is indeed a worry. But if this is the case then the precautionary principle should also be applied to the economics of the situation. There is no evidence apparent or demonstrated that the present global warming will be catastrophic. It would be much easier to demonstrate that the measures taken to ‘cure’ that would indeed be catastrophic.
Doug
At October 27, 2010 at 9:36 am
You start off with this statement:
Interesting to see these kinds of polls. It should be remembered that public opinion is as fickle as the weather …. Best to stick with science, and realize that public perception means very little…
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So you imperiously dismiss the public. Then you go on to make yet another imperiously superior statement.
R. Gates says: October 27, 2010 at 5:07 pm
The average voter is far more pursuaded by emotional appeal than any facts you can present to them. and this is especially true when trying to present information as difficult and complex as climate science.
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Can you not recognise the hubris that you are exhibiting in these posts? It wouldn’t be so bad if you used decent grammar.
Doug
R. Gates says:
Cool and skeptical distrust is as much an emotion as the warm and fuzzy compassion sparked by the poor stranded photoshopped polar bear– they are both at root an emotional reaction and will win far more votes than any attempt to explain the science.
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On that you are wrong, wrong, wrong, R.
The two just ain’t equal!!
Logical fallacy with a capital f-ing F.
But you go on believing that in your hard-wired, deterministic, predictable, party-line world. Nothing can penetrate that bubble, for sure.
You have proven that, for sure.
Believe what you want to believe. Everyone else sees it for what it is.
Next!
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
PS I am sure, as usual, you will not respond accordingly, and like an eel slipping out of the net, will wriggle away to another argument that you will try to corrupt with your pathetic sophistry.
Regarding the Judith Curry poll : even if it is skewed by traffic from skeptic sites, that’s informative of itself. Presumably the AGW sites have also linked to the poll and urged voting, as this site did. But I’ve found the pro-AGW sites seem to have a defeated air about them. The commenting isn’t as passionate, they seem to have lost their zest for fight. And I’m guessing that the dwindling traffic has just about given up on answering polls to defend the cause. It’s a long time since someone posted about something on realclimate and urged people to believe it as ‘the truth from real scientists’. And even longer since someone posted something like that and wasn’t immediately ridiculed.
R. Gates:
Cool and skeptical distrust is as much an emotion as the warm and fuzzy compassion sparked by the poor stranded photoshopped polar bear– they are both at root an emotional reaction and will win far more votes than any attempt to explain the science.
By which statement, Gates, you prove why you don’t know anything about the Scientific Method, where “cool and skeptical distrust” is in fact its very heart.