Via The Corner, something I always knew deep down, but never had succinctly coalesced into a single paragraph.
In 1999, Cass Sunstein wrote an article in the Harvard Law Review entitled “The Law of Group Polarization.” Its thesis was simple:
In a striking empirical regularity, deliberation tends to move groups, and the individuals who compose them, toward a more extreme point in the direction indicated by their own predeliberation judgments. For example, people who are opposed to the minimum wage are likely, after talking to each other, to be still more opposed; people who tend to support gun control are likely, after discussion, to support gun control with considerable enthusiasm; people who believe that global warming is a serious problem are likely, after discussion, to insist on severe measures to prevent global warming. This general phenomenon — group polarization – has many implications for economic, political, and legal institutions. It helps to explain extremism, “radicalization,” cultural shifts, and the behavior of political parties and religious organizations; it is closely connected to current concerns about the consequences of the Internet; it also helps account for feuds, ethnic antagonism, and tribalism.
I suppose this explains why extreme measures such as erecting thousands of expensive and sometimes operating windmills that blight the landscape, are often attractive to the global warming movement.
Imagine the howling if somebody wanted thousands of natural gas well derricks on the same plot of land in California, yet they would produce far more energy and help far more people, at a lower cost.
Oblique low-altitude aerial photo of wellpads, access roads, pipeline corridors and other natural-gas infrastructure in the Jonah Field of western Wyoming’s upper Green River valley. Photographer: Bruce Gordon, EcoFlight – Image via Flickr
https://www.google.com/search?q=pollution&hl=en&safe=off&client=firefox-a&hs=9J&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&prmd=imvnsb&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=6h4xUPKVCeb5ygHJy4GQAg&ved=0CFEQ_AUoAQ&biw=1016&bih=586
Just for fun:-
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21428590.200-political-divides-begin-in-the-brain.html
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn21640-us-scepticism–its-been-a-long-time-coming.html
@DirkH did not do the math or even read the essay, else he’d know that the volume concentrates near the radius asymptotically as the dimensions increase. Who fails to do arithmetic is doomed to nonsense. Just read the Wikipedia article, Dirk!
Re: Group Polarization and the Skeptics vs Warmists stand-off:
This is related to a phenomenon I explain with the term, The Theory of Acceleration: the idea that human events tend to accelerate a steady, low level of activity until they reach a point of crisis at which point the motion cannot be maintain harmoniously. Chaos erupts as disparate parts strike out on their own and then, independently, all cease motion altogether. A period of quiet stability results, and then the motion, regular and reasonable starts again. What triggers the acceleration is an unexpected event that disrupts the former regular motion but one that is outside of control of any of the elements.
The Theory struck me in an aerobics class in which we were leaping and stretching to the beat of a song. The tape machine suddenly stopped. The instructor left the room to get the music going again, leaving with instructions to us to keep the beat going until she came back. After she left, I noted that we began to speed up as a group. It appeared that one or two keeners in the front became the self-appointed Guardians of Timing, but that their enthusiasm lead them to try harder. The more the rest of us followed them, the harder they tried, until only the Guardians had the energy or natural rhythm to maintain the pace. The rest of the room broke down into a couple of groups trying to go half-time, but the integrity of the whole, broken, was too complex to either follow or ignore. Very quickly individuals were flailing away and then, embarrassed and confused. Stopped altogether. At the front the Guardians were still going strong when the instructor came back in the room, fiddled with the sound system controls and got us all going again.
Is this Group Polarization and Acceleration what we have seen in the Global Warming scene, I wonder. If so, then we would be in the early stages of the Crisis. Gore has noticeably left the stage, Suzuki has taken specific retirement from the stage (he officially left The David Suzuki Foundation so he could “speak his mind“ freely), and NIWA and the Australian BOM are refusing to publicly defend their prior positions (without denying them, however). The public is more assured in its skepticism, and Obama, Merkel and Brown are backing away from declarations of faith in the coming end of the world. Only Gillard, in Australia, is toeing the line with her Carbon Tax, while Hansen, Mann and the IPCC are becoming more extreme in their pronouncements of coming doom. The group is becoming discordant, with the Guardians of Timing – Hansen and the IPCC – trying not just to move quickly, but FASTER, while others, Obama included, seem to be in a dead-stop position.
If the Theory of Acceleration is correct, in conjunction with Group Polarization, it means that the Eco-Green CAGW movement is about to fall apart. An embarrassed confusion is to come to pass. On the basis of missed deadlines for disaster, and the length of time people can be persuaded to pursue a course before seeing results (I see 6 months to get something going, two years to have a process in place and moving, and five years to see results), I see 2015 as a critical year: the five years will be up then.
2010 was the start to the clock ticking. 2012 is demonstrably the warmest year of the global record by GISS, HadCru and satellite data. November 2009 (almost 2010) was the Copenhagen meeting in which the leaders determined to control CO2. In the two and a half years since then, the carbon market rose and fell, the EU has tried to tax international flights on the basis of their carbon dioxide emissions, and Gillard has put the Carbon Tax into legislation. One fail already, one doomed and the last unpopular enough likely to be cause a change of government. But also, beginning in 2009, the IPCC`s ability to get us in lockstep, like the tape machine in my aerobics class, has suffered a problem. Climategate initially, and then Donna LaFamboise, in particular, has caused the instructor to be called out of the room. We`re dancing on our own,and while the Guardians have taken over control, they no longer have a governor. We`ve got things going, we`ve got processes in place, and now we are in the place we start to look for results. Results that won`t come.
By the end of December, 2015, if temperatures have not begun a startling increase, if sea-levels have not shot up, it will be as it occurred to us in the exercise class: the instructor has been gone too long. The franticness of the keeners can`t be maintained without solid support of an overhanging beat any more for climate change tactics than they can for lycra-clothed dancers. Something will give and that will be public support for any CAGW talk.
BTW, the analogy with the aerobics class goes one further. Eventually the instructor came back and we were soon sweating in time again. Only the tune was different. So one might expect, if the analogy is predictive of human affairs, that by 2017 we will be in the beginning of a new crisis. With Hansen and Gore somewhere nearby, because the keeners always come back, and they are always somewhere near the front of the class.
Distance-compressed shot of antique wind chargers to misreport the ones erected today.
Here’s some pictures of the new ones.
http://www.airphotona.com/stockimg/images/00430.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8524489@N07/3666191079/
http://www.goldenstateimages.com/GSI_big.php?img=PWP-086
One does not simply walk into Mordor. Its black gates are guarded by more than just orcs. There is evil there that does not sleep. The great eye is ever watchful. It is a barren wasteland, riddled with death, and dust. The very air is filled with flying guillotines. The bones of ten thousand eagles line your path. It is folly.
Or dare to show that even the physics community is divided on the GHE. If you have the courage to look closely that is. Co2 causing warming has become a group think perspective. Sorry.
I don’t exactly agree with the quoted rhetoric in the article. Yes, undoubtedly, when sheeple follow a theme, they all tend to follow said theme. However, not all people are sheeple, and will question (as in ask the right questions) before finalising an opinion – and more rarely may even change their minds, or keep an open mind. Moreover, within a polarized group of people, there are usually some dissenters, or folk that are less than ‘convinced’ but may follow a general meme. I hate party politics for this reason – voting for a general theme when one doesn’t agree with parts of the manifesto for example (IMO, voting should be for the person most closely representing your views NOT the party line, and all politicians should essentially be independent)
So, the grouping/polarisation aspect can be often ‘imposed’, either by the folk themselves or ‘outsiders’ trying to assign a ‘label’ whn not all insiders are right to be so labeled!
But I do agree that group organisation is often undertaken by ‘others’ with alterior motives too – hence my disdain for sheeple!!
Bruce Atwood, I have read a number of research papers whose conclusions blamed climate change or global warming for whatever. Most would have failed if presented to my tenth grade biology teacher. Some would have failed if presented to one of my teachers in middle school. If you would read some of these research papers critically, you would also come to the conclusion that the researchers haven’t a clue about anything.
It is humorous that I find myself outcast from the group once again. Familiar territory.
I apologize, the coffee probably got the better of me, but I’m not exactly breaking new ground with my statement …
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/02/23/the-goracle-forecast-agwmore-snow/#comment-326637
“I’m sure those oil fields in Texas and Alberta look just as attractive as the wind farms above.”
I have seen the wind farms in California, and the oil fields in the Dakotas. The oil fields are much more attractive . . . less obstrusive.
Doug Proctor says:
August 19, 2012 at 11:06 am
“So one might expect, if the analogy is predictive of human affairs, that by 2017 we will be in the beginning of a new crisis.”
With all the LOTR references in the thread, I thought this quote was apropos:
Always after a defeat and a respite, the Shadow takes another shape and grows again. -Gandalf
Put the photo of the wind farm next to a photo of the oilfields of the 30s and 40s of Oklahoma or California, and ask the greenies how the wind farm is superior to the oil field. They are both (or all three) photos of forests of derricks. The biggest difference is, like you said, that the oil field produced more energy at a lower unit cost than the wind farm.
beesaman says @August 18, 2012 at 6:23 pm: “We see that over the next few weeks if Arctic ice falls below certain levels. No allowance will be given for the fact that it is being measured using different systems to last year . . .”
Can you clarify this statement? Is it just a reference to the satellite failure in October of last year? Has any suspicion been raised about the graphs that we know see? (It certainly seems like we are heading to a bonafide new minimum in Arctic Ice extent.)
It takes someone on the Harvard Law Review to make it official that members of groups feed off each other?
Duh.
Double duh.
Steve Garcia
And, oh yeah:
Feeding off each other is fueled by confirmation bias. Don’t forget that.
They hear more and more of what they want to hear, and – in the group setting – none of what they don’t want to hear. Hence, Goebbel’s Law comes into effect, that a lie repeated enough times becomes the truth.
And it happens on both sides of the argument, don’t forget. We do some of that, too. We should be on the look out for that among ourselves.
We here bring in science, as we all know, but we do also pat each skeptical scientist on the back and slap the opponent scientists around. But we DO at least – unlike RealClimate, in particular – give mention of the warmist papers and articles. Scientists who won’t even allow people to hear the opposing arguments are not and cannot be scientists, but advocates. Where advocacy starts, science ends.
I came here as a nominal warmist, not knowing any better one way or the other. Before that, after five minutes on the warmist sites and I was barfing. I also want to be where the most science is presented. I don’t want to be pilloried and swaddled into a belief – especially not on a scientific subject. I do not like to be force-fed.
Everyone here is entitled to their own opinions. When warmists have come hgere, I have actually been impressed with how civil the disagreements are. Over at Judy Curry’s ‘neutral’ site, on the other hand, there have been some nasty exchanges. But at least, here or there, it isn’t – as Harvard has named it – group polarization via feeding off each other.
This brings up the question: If a warmist paper actually was sound science, would we listen and adapt to it? I would. But in well over ten years now, I haven’t seen one that wasn’t based on flawed assumptions and/or flawed adjustments and/or GIGO model outputs. When I do, I will holler. And I doubt I will be the first one pointing at it. Someone else here will be beat me to the punch in saying “Holy crap! They actually did real science!”
Steve Garcia
It seems that if one lives long enough one gets to see a lot of re-runs. When I was very young I lived in a society that was becoming more polarised as time went on. From my naive point of view at that time, since I did not understand politics, it seemed that people were just finding excuses to be rude to each other.
Luckily for me and my immediate family we left for half way around the globe. Fortunately we were able to see the stupidity from far away. Towards the end of the polarisation cycle, words turned into actions: occupation of factories, occupation of towns, and occupation of large farms. As is typical at the end of these cycles, along comes a man with simple solutions. This one seemed like a large Wagnerian operatic production. As it is common with Wagnerian operas, things end badly for some of the participants. This one ended badly for a lot of the participants: mass executions, disappearances, torture, and then came the post end retributions.
It always concerns me when people become enamoured of their hypotheses, and are not willing to treat them just as hypotheses; and are not willing to diminish their importance on reasonable evidence.
I hope the present cycle of polarisation changes into something more constructive.
Lucy Skywalker says:
August 19, 2012 at 1:40 am
“I disagree with Sunstein’s statement. And I disagree on the basis of considerable evidence from WUWT itself.”
“Many if not most people here were, once, warmists. They didn’t polarize, they changed sides on closer perusal of the evidence. ”
dido…some folks can actually formulate their own independent thoughts and conclusions from sources not found mainstream TV drama. Maybe the rest are lazy, or are liken to follow the heard over the cliff. Sheep need us dogs to protect them from the wolves; however they do not recognize they are sheep.
And the failure of renewables to perform as advertised, and the success of fracking, and the failure of China et al. to cut their emissions, and the defeat of the Gilliard gov’t., and more defectors like Lovelock, and the failures of green cars, and the global financial crisis, and perhaps Climategate3, and maybe the success of Rossi …–what’s up with him lately?, and …
feet2thefire says:
August 19, 2012 at 1:05 pm
I tend to agree – but with a slight addendum that on the skeptical side, confirmation bias (if you like) is somewhat more difficult to behold. Sure, we know that the likes of Gavin et al, simply pedal their pet theories and blanket support them – but in skeptical sense (as in, the true scientific method way), you cannot really be too skeptical, can you? As you rightly say, any decent, correctly, well scientifically founded paper would/should be accepted by us all, no matter what the conclusion. Warmist or not, skeptic or not – if you have the science correctly nailed, it will be accepted. I know there were diehards against plate tectonics and suchlike, but in the end the evidence was irrefutable. Any ‘pet’ theory will have it’s followers, but the REAL scientists will never simply promote it without due substance, which, in truth, is exactly what has happened in the climate science echelons. After nearly 30 years of ‘proving’, where is the evidence, where is the sound science, where is the truth? It ain’t there, and from that, after the billions of dollars in research, someone with an open mind would usually conclude that the wrong tree is being barked up! – as far as I can see, that is the only confirmation bias I ‘carry’ myself!
beng says:
August 19, 2012 at 7:24 am
thanks Beng – where do I send the bill for a new keyboard! 🙂
One of the consequences of polarisation may be unrest in the US in 2020. I hope this is wrong.
http://www.nature.com/news/human-cycles-history-as-science-1.11078
What does that mean?
I gather my “hamburger: comment was kill completely. Please email your critique.
REPLY: You said in a follow up comment (which you also asked me to delete) to delete it if it was over the line, now you question that I have? Sorry not wasting time on that – Anthony
I have many friends of different race and religion…. we all get on well together. we can talk about race and religion, and no-one ostracises anyone.
Try to talk about CAGW, and take the skeptic view…… very different story.
The polarisation has gone WAY further than most race and/or religious differences.