While I despise statistics, I guiltily resort to them from time to time; the rest of the time, I come to my own conclusions from what I see on a wide variety of network news and cable opinion news (both MSNBC and Fox).  By training I draw threads of evidence together and reach a conclusion, which is precisely what any decent lawyer does in court or when arguing an appeal.  I have reasoned and hunched that most climate deniers are  right of center and dogmatically dedicated to mostly evangelical and fundamentalist religions. 

Only recently a segment of a show was dedicated to an attempt to reconcile science and religion with regard to climate change (no longer called global warming because too many deniers held that term absurd, just look at the blizzard in New York City.  (Reminds me of the evolution deniers.  They claim that God put the fossils in the earth "to fool Darwinists"!)  The white preachers who joined some scientists on a junket to Juneau left the conclave clinging to their denier beliefs.  (I was tempted to italicize the last word of that sentence: Boobical nuts hold in deathgrip their sacred texts, and since God is omnipotent He can be a bit capricious with climate phenomena; after all, He works in mysterious ways.)  But one African-American pastor said he had changed his mind; he now believed in climate change.


Anyone who would believe that God put fossils in the earth to fool evolutionists is beyond the pale.  There is no help in him.  He must insist that climate change is a socialist Godless plot to turn the U.S. into a third world country by shutting down its coal burning gas guzzling manufacturing and consuming habits, including gluttonous gobbling up of precious hydrocarbonous resources.  (The nuclear family goes to church on Sunday in a Suburban, which gets about as good mileage as a Sherman tank, while the rest of the week Mom does her shopping in the same vehicle, going across town and back...alone.)


Politically, these folks tend to be Republicans.  A lot are tea party.  They like Palin and Beck and their ilk.  They are basically misguided boobs who might mean well in some disordered mind, but who propel us forward to their version of the Rapture, since ignoring climate change can only result in Bloomberg's Nightmare coast to coast.  We will end up spending money we do not have just to save us from a Century of Catastrophes.  Naomi Klein got it right when she pointed up the race between the Jihadists and climate deniers to end what was once called America.  Perhaps the world itself.



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@ Chris,

Isn't it amazing, and alarming, the affect that cognitive bias has on decision making?  Peetpeet and Paul choose to ignore the evidence that contradicts their beliefs, and accept only that which supports those beliefs.  Even when evidence for AGW vastly overwhelms the evidence for denial.


I wonder if they also believe the earth is flat?  There are websites for that too!  why don't they believe those websites?

Maybe the moon landings were fake too! 


One would think that most members of AN would have a rudimentary understanding of what selection bias is and how to evaluate and weigh sources, but I guess that would be still more wishful thinking.


Oh well, keep on fighting the good fight.

I don't understand why people still think our predecessors thought the earth was flat. It's false history to believe anyone did. 


Unfortunately people still subscribe to the following ethos

We believe:

  1. The bible is the inspired Work of God.  It is inerrant in its original writing, and that it is the only infallible rule for faith and life.
  2. In one God, creator of heaven and earth, eternally existing in three persons:  God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.
  3. Jesus Christ is God’s only begotten Son, born of a virgin, and is fully God, and fully man. God’s revelation of Himself, His purpose, and His will was completed in Jesus Christ as is recorded in the Bible.
  4. The Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity. His ministry is to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. During this age, He draws men to God; convicts men of sin, righteousness and judgment; indwells and seals the believer at conversion; comforts, guides, instructs and empowers the believer for godly service. The evidence of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the fruit that He produces in believer.
  5. Man was created in the image of God. Man sinned, bringing upon himself both physical and spiritual death, which is separation from God.
  6. Jesus Christ died for our sins as a substituionary sacrifice; He arose bodily from the dead, and ascended into heaven where He now serves as our advocate.
  7. The shed blood of Jesus Christ provides the only basis for salvation to all who believe.
  8. We are eternally saved when we recognize ourselves as sinners and put our faith in Christ, not because of any work we do. All who receive Christ through faith are born again in the Holy Spirit.
  9. In the personal, premillenial, and imminent return of Jesus Christ, and that this “Blessed Hope” has a vital bearing on the personal life and service of the believer.
  10. The church is the body of Christ which is made up of every born again believer and will be caught up to meet the Lord in the air at the rapture. A local church is an organized body of baptized believers voluntarily associated together for the worship of God, growth in godliness, the fellowship of believers, the speaking forth of the gospel of Jesus Christ throughout the world, and the observance of the biblical ordinances (immersion baptism and communion supper). The local church is independent and free from all outside ecclesiastical or political interference.
What's this "Holy Spirit" stuff?  I quit drinking about 16 years ago, so booze isn't holy to me anymore.

My reply to LarryL was to show how some people are locked into group think. It shouldn't be surprising that inerrant Christians who think the resurrection of Jesus will lift them to heaven don't care about the environment. 


James G. Watt, the Secratary of the Interior under President Ronald Reagan was noted as saying After the last tree is felled, Christ will come back.


I've met and worked with people who think that way. They don't care about environmental issues because the resurrection is coming. 


James G. Watt was a lunatic who, as I recall, was given the boot after a particularly obnoxious and insensitive comment.  You address what I call the foregone conclusions of apocalyptic belief.  It cannot happen fast enough for them.  They are eager for Rapture and they will do anything necessary to bring it about.  Some also say that if God wanted them to be concerned about such things as climate change, "He would not allow it to happen."  No point countering with a comparison of this kind of "thinking" with that of Jihadists who claim their Koran promises a trip to Paradise and 72 virgins (or precious grapes, take your pick -- depends on how you translate Arabic) when you get there.  The sad thing is, you cannot argue with these assholes.  You cannot win any argument with someone whose only argumentative support is dogma.  Do you believe in God? Yes, the Bible tells me so.  What makes you think there is a God?  The Bible tells me so.  What if the Bible was written by Satan?  Oh, no, the Bible is the literal word of God himself.  Good luck penetrating these fallacious minds.

Here's something I gleaned off Wikapedia to show you how strong the Christian movement is - in case you didn't know.

Some Christians believe that the Second Coming of Jesus Christ cannot occur until the Third Temple is constructed in Jerusalem, which requires the appearance of a red heifer born in Israel. Clyde Lott, a cattle breeder in O'Neill, NebraskaUnited States, is attempting to systematically breed red heifers and export them to Israel to establish a breeding line of red heifers in Israel in the hope that this will bring about the construction of the Third Temple and ultimately the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.[6][7]

I have come to the conclusion that we need to elect a secret atheist president who will issue an executive order his first day in office: all religious nuts, even those with improbable names like Clyde Lott, shall be put in reorientation camps and taught that THERE IS NO GOD BUT MAN.  Religions need not be outlawed, just their practice.  I would have the national guard go into churches, cathedrals, mosques, and synagogues on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays, round up the belivers and brand them on the butt with big letters spelling FOOL.  Then tell them that if they persist in the ultimate in illogical ideas they will be put into public stocks.  I stop short at stoning, though.
Here's an interesting video: The Story of Electronics
I've posted a small blog at Secular Perspectives on " Evolving Spring: Plant and Animal Vulnerabilities"  http://t.co/G77EXVq It discusses recent trends on early spring and the consequences for animals and plants. There's a link to a host of evidence for climate change.
thanks for that Gary.  I read your post and left you a question on your blog.   Thanks again.


Here's my non-expert thoughts on your question.

I think that the effect on plants and animals (over the next 10-50 years) remains an open research question since we know so little about many of the species, their evolutionary path and their ecological interconnections.

What we do know, as summarized in places like
http://www.climateandweather.net/global_warming/effects_on_animals.htm, is worrisome on a scale of 10-50 years; since there may not be time for ecologically stable, species adaptation in such a short time.

There is quite a bit of insight to the problem offered on the National Geographic TV show "Strange Days on Planet Earth" - http://www.pbs.org/strangedays/episodes/onedegreefactor/experts/oth...

Thanks for posting that - lack of cold winters also indicate a problem.


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