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A balanced view does not reflect the scientific consensus on climate change. Credit: iStockphoto MELBOURNE: Airing the views of climate change sceptics in the media may only be serving to keep the global warming controversy boiling, argue scientists. Leading climate change experts have warned the World Conference of Science Journalists in Melbourne, Australia, that a balanced view does not always reflect the consensus of the research community. Kevin Hennessy, a lead scientist with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said yesterday that media attention on "the view of a handful of climate change sceptics" amplifies their opinions and "implies that there is little agreement about the basic facts of global warming". Hennessy is also with the marine and atmospheric division of Australian government research body, CSIRO. Speaking in a session about climate change reporting, he said editors and journalists have a duty to ensure that facts are presented in context. Balanced reporting, he said, "perpetuates the public's perception that scientists are in disarray, which is misleading in the case of climate change". Geoff Love, secretary of the IPCC and former deputy director of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, said that IPCC assessment reports from 1990 through to this year are strong evidence of "the coming together of the scientific community." Emphasis on the sceptic view does not help public understanding of climate change, said Love. Media coverage has not always reflected the consensus of the majority of the scientific community, said Ian Lowe, president of the Australian Conservation Foundation a non-profit environment group. "That only makes the public and political discussion more difficult," he said. The problem is compounded by a lack of reporting on climate change, according to Chris Mooney, a U.S.-based science journalist attending the conference. Although the 2006 hurricane season attracted a lot of media attention, Mooney presented statistics from the United States showing that climate change has never been a priority in the media. The situation is similar in Africa, said Ochieng' Ogodoa a Kenyan correspondent for London, U.K.-based news web site SciDev.Net. Articles about deaths caused by floods or other natural disasters, and political scandals related to climate change tend to get precedence, he said. Readers' comments
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global warming reporting
Thank goodness we have all these politically correct a**&#@s making sure we only read what they want us to read. Wouldn't want the truth exposed.
global warming PC
When the global warming police start complaining about balanced coverage, or looking at the problem from several viewpoints other than their own, this implies something very important that they would wish to hide. If straight science, not ideology, proves a point, then letting alternate viewpoints exist, to be proved wrong easily and scientifically, only causes the original point to become stronger. But when a group tries to limit debate, the casual observer can see easily that that group does not want the full story made public. The obvious implication is that the group's point of view is not provable by science but only by ideology, and members of the group are aware of this unpleasant fact.
Right on!
Right on! Journalists have to start being more balanced in their coverage. Every balanced story on evolution should have a quote from intelligent design folk, and stories on HIV mention that a clique of scientists deny it causes AIDS. What about the Big Bang? A massive conspiracy of tens of thousands of scientists suppressing the real and valid objections of a number of talented pension-age cosmologists. And why is hat that every time a shuttle is reported to have orbited the Earth, is not the Flat Earth Society asked to comment?
Journalism too readily reflects peer-review science of the highest calibre, while a handful of superannuated objectors get only 50% of air time. How is that fair, I ask you?
absolutely!!!
just like those idiots Galileo and Copernicus. Defying the majority of scientists who knew the planets revolved around the Earth!
Global Warming
Remember when all the hot-shot climate scientists were reporting another Ice Age? Global Warming comes down to two things: 1) making sure climate scientists have a steady flow of research grants and 2) Making political hay for Al Gore and his cronies. I'll buy Global Warming when Al Gore buys an electric car.
Buy a clue
When he does buy an electric car, if he gets any change perhaps he can buy a clue or two for the climate change sceptics. From what I see they don't seem to have one to share between them.
Global warming actually comes down to two different things: 1) Basic laws of physics (thermodynamics etc) 2) A wealth of evidence and historical precedent.
Why is it so easy for some to believe in the implausible yet so hard to accept rational argument?
Clue Acquired Long Ago
"Rational argument"??? Mt. Pinatubo in the Phillipines put more crap in the atmosphere (toxics, greenhouse, particulates, the whole schmeer) in a single eruption (1991) than mankind has in the last 250 years...but the Earth is dying because the rich won't stop driving those nasty SUV's. Rational??? Pardon my guffaw!
Do the math
I think Mt Pinatubo released around 45 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide and about 20 million tonnes of sulphur dioxide in the 1991 eruption.
We're currently releasing between 6000 and 7000 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxode into the atmosphere each year.
Not sure where you're getting your figures from, but seems like someone misplaced a decimal point (or several!) somewhere.
Take a look at some standard graphs of carbon dioxide emissions over the last 250 years - there is no massive spike in 1991.
Buy a clue
You are a credit to your public education.
How insightful
That really is a blistering come back, oh it hurts so bad - if only it were true.
Is that really the best defence of your position you have?