48 Climate Experts Speak Out Against "Forces Of Darkness" - Corporate Disinformation

[hatrack]

Nov. 10, 2006 — "We just haven't been doing the hard work of getting across to the public just how serious the situation is!" The speaker was one of 48 American climate experts gathered from around the country and crowded into a small second-floor hotel meeting room for an all-day closed-door strategy session.

All day, the midtown Manhattan traffic swirled unnoticed beneath the windows as these men and women — which included not only a number of America's pre-eminent climate scientists but two psychologists and other experts too — wrestled with what they call a crisis. Convened by Yale's Project on Climate Change at the Yale School of Forestry and Environment Studies, its purpose was not to debate global warming science but to figure out how to convey its most important findings to the public "with appropriate urgency and sustained for the long haul." It is a goal these scientists see constantly thwarted by what they dubbed "the forces of darkness" — a persistent disinformation campaign, waged by some fossil fuel companies and cooperating politicians that downplays the gravity of global warming.

"We will leave our children and grandchildren a ruined world if we don't dramatically change our behavior, and soon," said Gus Speth, dean of the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, after the meeting broke up. To encourage frank discussion, Yale imposed what are called Chatham House Rules: No one attending, including the four invited journalists, could attribute quotes to specific people. The assembled scientists pondered how they might create some sort of new "bridging institution" between scientists and the public.

They reviewed the tactics of naysayers who persistently "trick" journalists into thinking they have to present "the other side" on basic aspects of climate change, even though virtually all the world's thousands of professional climatologists now agree on them.

EDIT

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/GlobalWarming/story?id=2644462&page=1

[civildisoBDence]

1. You wonder what the agendas of some of the forces of darkness are

The petrochemical industry and auto industry have obvious interests here--but what's with the rest of them?

I had a student give a speech last week ridiculing the whole idea of global warming. He said that for every study that says global warming is happening and is caused in part by humans, there was another that said the opposite. Didn't bother to cite even one, though--as if you can discredit scientists with pure ideology.

The worst of the bunch are Hannity and Limbaugh, whose only agenda seems to be to cover their jet-flying SUV-driving asses.

Newsprism

[electropop]

4. I hope you flunked him.

Next time, maybe he'll do the research first. :grr:

[nam78_two]

2. k&r/nt

[The2ndWheel]

3. "dramatically change our behavior"

Meaning what exactly? Finding new and efficient ways of exploitation and consumption, or dramatically changing that behavior? To my knowledge, that's the only behavior we've exhibited.

[JohnWxy]

5. Cheney / Exxon-Mobil administration is involved in this too:

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/actnow?bid=4&pid=56326

Nation readers don't need me to tell them how frantically the Bush Administration tries to avoid both transparency and accountability. On issue after issue, the Bushies have worked in secret to keep the public and Congress out of its policy-making loop and have dealt with bad news the same way every time: by trying to bury it.

Take the most recent example: the Administration is trying to gag NASA's top climate scientist--Dr. James Hansen--because he had the temerity to speak out publicly about the threats of global warming. Hansen made a speech last December 6 at an American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco calling for prompt action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions--a message that the Bush Administration does not want to hear despite the fact that 2005 was one of the hottest years on record, a finding that puts eight of the past 10 years at the top of the charts in terms of high temperatures. Since his SF speech, Hansen says that NASA's public affairs office has insisted on screening all material he presents to the public, and on one occasion an agency press officer even turned down a journalist's request for an interview with Hansen, which the doctor wanted to do.

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[OnionPatch]

6. So I wonder if they came up with anything

to combat the disinformation campaign. The article didn't really say whether they came up with any answers as to how they might educate the public.

Why don't they do some commercials? It would be pretty easy: Have a list of the world's scientists who agree global warming is real scrolling down one side of the screen and the names of the naysayer scientists scrolling on the other. Both lists should be arranged with the names under headers showing the intitutions they represent. It will be clear to anyone that one side will have very few names, and they will all be under the headers of Chevron, Exxon, etc.

Oh and I think the teeny tiny list should be on the RIGHT side of the screen. ;)