Mike Jonas writes:
The BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation, UK) looks at analysis that could lead to more moderate attitudes.
This BBC article provides some food for thought that is relevant to the climate debate. It looks at a paper “Political Extremism Is Supported by an Illusion of Understanding” by Fernbach, Rogers, Fox and Sloman, which shows how people’s mistaken sense that they understand underlying causal processes can be used to improve the quality of their arguments and lead to more moderate attitudes.
That is something that the climate science debate could really do with – but be warned: it doesn’t just apply to others, it applies to you too!
The BBC article is here:
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140521-the-best-way-to-win-an-argument
and the Fernbach et al paper is here:
http://pss.sagepub.com/content/24/6/939.short
Who knows what the article says, but the premise is odd, given the lengths the BBC goes NOT to call terrorists terrorists.
Instead we have
rebels
activists
militants
this even in the case of internationally acknowledged groups such as Hamas, who are regularly characterised by the BBC as “militants”.
Chuck out your TV – you really won’t miss it – and stop funding this arsehole of an institution.
@Shoshin says: May 23, 2014 at 7:09 am
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Yup. The Guardian is the same – simply questioning CAGW can get you banned. “Facts are sacred” they claim – except when we need to change them.
Climate zealots are an extreme minority and a lost cause. The reason to debate them is not to change their minds but to give interested spectators facts and insights the media ignores. It is ok to point out (nicely) that they are wrong to engage their ego’s. Bystanders can see who has the facts and who is resorting to name calling.
I’ve had great success over the years getting people to change their views 180 degrees by using some of the techniques they mention. Our educational system trains people to repeat what they are told rather than think for themselves. It takes some gentle hand holding, but walking people through how cause and effect works using empirical facts, gives them the understanding to see how their belief’s don’t match reality. The pervasive propaganda in the media has created a false reality in the minds of most people. The vast majority of the public has no idea that there are facts supporting a skeptical view of the mainstream media’s presentation of this subject. These are the people who will turn the tides and can be reached at social gatherings if you are brave enough to speak out.
“explain how the policy they were advocating would work.”
The trouble with this is that it leaves assumptions and variant meanings hidden, from oneself and others. The wildest utopian commonly thinks his half-baked pipe-dreams would work well.
The only way I’ve seen work to solve such conflicts is to dig down to the sometimes microscopically difference in meaning between a very few terms which are at the base of the disagreement. Doing that invariably raises the heat geometrically until the telling point is reached. Unfortunately, too many people fail to persist to that point. Too many people shut down in the face of even collegial verbal argumentation. They find it too stressful, while others revel in it and seek it out, hoping to elicit gems of import.
I see nothing inherently wrong with “extremism” or “radicalism”, and nothing inherently good about “moderation”.
Very good, and with three zingers, too.
Gamecock says:
May 23, 2014 at 6:30 am
Sorry, I don’t see how this has anything to do with the best way to win an argument.
People tend to not understand things as well as they think they do. When challenged to explain, they start to realize their lack of understanding. Fine. This is not new behavior.
“shows how people’s mistaken sense that they understand underlying causal processes can be used to improve the quality of their arguments and lead to more moderate attitudes.”
“People’s mistaken sense . . . can be used to improve the quality of their arguments.”
Nonsense.
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Gamecock illustrates the wrong behavior
from the article.
“You are, I’m afraid to say, mistaken. The position you are taking makes no logical sense. Just listen up and I’ll be more than happy to elaborate on the many, many reasons why I’m right and you are wrong. Are you feeling ready to be convinced?
Whether the subject is climate change, the Middle East or forthcoming holiday plans, this is the approach many of us adopt when we try to convince others to change their minds. It’s also an approach that, more often than not, leads to the person on the receiving end hardening their existing position.”
Here is what I would suggest to Gamecock.
Tell us how argument works. Explain how you change someone’s mind.
“Bruce Cobb says:
May 23, 2014 at 6:36 am
Debating a belief system which is all that CAGW is, is a waste of time and effort. Facts don’t matter to them, nor does logic. They are burdened with emotion and irrationality, and thus immune to facts and logic.”
Bruce elaborates on why the alarmists are wrong, ironically showing us that the article is correct.
‘”You are, I’m afraid to say, mistaken. The position you are taking makes no logical sense. Just listen up and I’ll be more than happy to elaborate on the many, many reasons why I’m right and you are wrong. Are you feeling ready to be convinced?
Whether the subject is climate change, the Middle East or forthcoming holiday plans, this is the approach many of us adopt when we try to convince others to change their minds. It’s also an approach that, more often than not, leads to the person on the receiving end hardening their existing position.””
Lesson for Bruce. explain why the earth is warmer than the moon.
The best way to win a scientific argument is this. I had it applied to me by a colleague, years ago. We could not resolve a difference of opinion, so he said, “as a scientist, you must accept the possibility that you are wrong”. I answered, Yes, I do. “Well I don’t, so I win.”
In the case of energy and agriculture, we do indeed face a generation that believes itself to be capable of destroying these sectors of the economy and replacing them with something else. Some of them believe that in the act of destroying energy and agriculture, new and better systems will spontaneously emerge. There is no classical engineer who would ever, ever take such a position and expect to keep his license to practice.
The people under these illusions would be totally distressed by products that don’t work, products that are extremely expensive which were once plentiful and cheap, shortages, and famines – all of which would result from destroying energy and agriculture. They also are not aware that top-down remaking of economies and agriculture have been implemented before in history with totally disastrous and deadly results. Therefore, you can expect that you are talking with people who 1. do not know their own limitations, and 2. have had collectivist history hidden from them.
Our situation in the US can be summarized by the saying, “The only difference between theory and practice is that in theory there is no difference.”
Freakomics have a relevant important new point
1- We program children to never say IT,
2- There is immense pressure in employment especially for powerful leaders never to say IT
.. so we have massive inbuilt bias, leading to bad judgement
The IT is “I don’t know”
see The Three Hardest Words in the English Language
– in The list of Freakonomics Podcasts
Rhys Jaggar says:
May 23, 2014 at 6:49 am
____________________
Your comments match what I have observed and experienced. Not only that, but your descriptions are remarkably clear, succinct and easy to understand.
Thank you.
The ‘warmists’ are one step ahead of this one, which only works if both sides engage in ‘fact based reasoning’, or at least think they do. Global warming discussions don’t work that way, at least in my experience. They go something like this. Sceptic: “for 17 years, no warming”. Believer: its happening ‘because all the scientists say so’. Using the BBC method described, sceptic could ask “why do you think that?” The response is still ‘because all the scientists say so’. It doesn’t matter what the warmist is asked to explain, his answer is always ‘because all the scientists say so’. The ‘warmist’ have so thoroughly engendered this position, that it will take a massive glaciation to open a chink in the armor. This years record cold winter certainly made no dent.
Article now available worldwide ?
As posted above the article didn’t seem avaible abroad and just as I started to hack Google and Bing’s caches .. It suddenly appeared working on the original URL
After reading more of the comments, I would agree that moderation can be quite costly and irresponsible if it leads to half a policy in place of stopping and backing away from a policy disaster. See VA system and “we don’t pick winners” DOE grant policy for renewable energy. As for carbon mitigation, it might be quantified as $3 trillion in place of $6 trillion in the budget and debt add on.
The BBC is advising warmistas to avoid facts. Because nobody really understands facts to the nth degree, so you can play the skeptic with skeptics. They so smart.
You can comment on the BBC Future Facebook page as their is a discussion there abkut the article
Charles Davis says:
May 23, 2014 at 10:03 am
Charles, the trick is not to stop too soon. Keep drilling down with questions:
“Because all the scientists say so.”
-All what scientists?
“Climate scientists.”
-All? Every single one?
“97 percent of them.”
-And how was that number determined?
“A survey, or something.”
-When and where was it done? Who participated? How many participated? What were the questions on the survey?
“uh…. this one goes to 11.”
Sorry, Spinal Tap joke at the end there.
The argument sounds very similar to what used to be called “thinking it through”.
Caroline Lucas (British Green Party) the other night on BBC. Thanks to the proxy provider for this!
Explains that the UK should not allow fracking because of the CO2 emissions, and that’s the last thing we should do when catastrophic warming is on its way. Instead, and the implication was that it would somehow lower or avert global warming, the UK should move to powering itself from wind and solar.
The interviewer did not think to ask how much difference it would make to warming if the UK did that.
A number of BBC current affairs journalists have been recently found expressing uninhibited adverse views on social media about a particular political party in the 22 May ballot. This is in clear breach of rules on impartiality, which is explicit in the BBC’s Charter. I wonder what techniques BBC managers used to persuade those journalists of the rightness of impartiality. I wonder what techniques BBC managers have instituted to effect reinforcement of those rules.
Sasha says:
May 23, 2014 at 6:52 am
There is a word for this: ‘explication’. Any good professor will challenge his/her students to explicate their claims. Most professors do not.
All this really proves is that most people don’t understand what they believe nearly as well as they think they do.
As for ‘winning an argument’ – even this ‘soft’ method won’t have any effect on an ideologue who won’t tolerate being asked questions and who refuses to explain their position in any detail.
“They were asked to trace, step by step, from start to finish, the causal path from the policy to the effects it was supposed to have.”
And if it fails? Do more of it, and make sure no one else can do anything else. Eliminate all the small competing theories, eliminate all of the control groups which might show that shutting down coal plants and forcing organic agriculture on the US are a failure, resulting in rising costs and shortages.
This is how progressive scientists roll. So there is no need to soften your position if you think that results and feed back from these social experiments should not be ignored.
@Steven, what got your panties in such a bunch, and why are you asking about earth vs moon’s warmth?
CAGW Believers simply want to, nay need to believe. Facts and logic simply do not matter to them. I’m not convinced they matter much to you, either.
Derek Sorensen says:
May 23, 2014 at 6:44 am
Annoyingly, the referenced BBC page isn’t accessible from within the UK:
“We’re sorry but this site is not accessible from the UK as it is part of our international service and is not funded by the licence fee. It is run commercially by BBC Worldwide, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the BBC, the profits made from it go back to BBC programme-makers to help fund great new BBC programmes.”
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Try Startpage.com, tick the appropriate boxes and you should be able to get to the page. Start page will funnel you through a server somewhere in the world so you won’t be recognized at an English IP address. Helps me get past the Great Firewall when I’m in that part of the world.
” it applies to you too!”
No it doesn’t.