Why deny Climate Change?

Roughly 97% of all academic papers published on the topic concur that the Earth's climate is changing, that global mean temperatures are on the rise, and that human fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions are playing a major part in this rapid change.

The consequences of not acting on this issue are catastrophic by all educated hypotheses and theories. The financial impact will without a doubt be in the trillions over the next few decades. The loss of human life associated with severe climate change is even more cataclysmic. Just look at the financial and human toll of a storm like Hurricane Sandy where 10,000 jobs and over a billion dollars were lost. It is undeniable that widespread severe weather is increasing, and that such weather can be linked with global climate change. Droughts, floods, storms, the and bitter freezing cold caused by the polar vortex this past year are all examples of the damage we are inflicting on ourselves.

Scientific research has directly correlated CO2 in the atmosphere with fluctuations in Earth's temperature over millions of years. By what stretch of the imagination can those who deny this phenomenon believe that it is perfectly fine to continue polluting our atmosphere with greenhouse gases empirically proven to be linked with increases in global temperature? The evidence is overwhelming, so why do people continue to deny that the climate is changing and that humans are a key factor in causing this change?

because people are stupid

Because Stupid people are allowed to have opinions, even over things that are facts.

Unfortunately a lot of those stupid people find a way to get themselves elected to public office.

For arguments sake:

While the majority of scientists do agree that the increase of human produced CO2 is a direct result of industrial activities, there are still mountains of issues with this conclusion, such as:

-If human produced Carbon Dioxide has increased, why have the levels of naturally produced C02 not increased with them?

-If the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is indeed causing increased temperatures via a greenhouse effect, why has Arctic ice coverage increased every year since 2005

-What, if any effect, does carbon dioxide have on the atmosphere, considering the presence of natural gases such as nitrogen and oxygen?

Also, it's well known the IPCC blocks any data that contradicts it's accepted version of events.

Further more, NASA had a satellite that was measuring JUST temperature, for almost 11 years, and it only measured a .05 increase in temperature.

Check out some more stuff here, Justfacts.com Climate Change

The people who deny it are mostly religious nuts.

Because accepting Climate Change doesn't suit them.

Same reason why people deny Evolution.

1. Why would naturally produced CO2 increase?

2. You have to look at it on a long term global scale. Globally and over multiple years the mean temperature is increasing. You cannot focus on specific regions or years and get an accurate representation of the trend. Also what source is the finding that ice coverage has increased come from? Can you link me to it?

3. I don't understand your question. CO2, Nitrogen, and Oxygen are all different elements and have vastly different effects.

4. The IPCC doesn't have the power to block insependent scientists. It is not some vast conspiracy in the scientific community. If there was significant evidence to contradict climate chang it would come forward.

5. (.05) is still 5%, that is a drastic change in basically a decade. If you view it in the span of millenia then you will see that is a very rapid change.

Same reasons people deny evolution, because of ignorance and stupidity, it makes them feel uncomfortable if they accept it.

I don't want to start another bash religion thread but sadly this is the case here in the US

1) Well naturally the levels of C02 increasing would coincide with each other. However, naturally produced C02 levels have remained generally stable. Therefore, it would appear the processes with which Co2 is naturally absorbed are absorbing the increased output of man made co2.

2) Global temperature has only increased by .05 degrees though, over the course of at least 20 years since they started measuring. Further, by using proxy data (as explained from my link) we can infer temperature increases prior to the 80s correspond with this trend. As for the ice:

Here , Here , and This guy here

3) I should have expanded this. So much attention is made on Co2, that we dont take into account the other elements of the atmosphere. Is the presence of increased levels of c02 affecting these gases?

4) See Climategate

5) 0.05 is not 5%, that would be 0.05%, and thats over at least 30 years.

I'll put it in a perspective. Obama is opposed to the keystone XL pipeline coming out of Alberta, for one of many reasons being that it will, his words "drastically increase" C02 levels in Alberta. According to a full study done by Environment Canada, the oil sands (an area roughly the size of the N.E United States) is responsible for about .5% of Alberta's total C02 emmisions. Alberta in turn is responsible for about 2-3% of Canada's emmisions and Canada is responsible for maybe, 5% of global emmisions. The U.S in turn, with coal fired plants and fraking operations everywhere, is responsible for about 64% of global c02 emmissions.

1. Why would they coincide with each other? They are not directly connected. Man-made CO2 emission does not have a causal relationship with output from natural sources. Also your presumption that the natural processes that absorb CO2 are fully absorbing the increased output is dependent upon the amount of CO2 being found in the atmosphere being roughly the same which isn't true.

2. An increase of half a degree is significant though. That is 2.5 degrees in 100 years, enough to catastrophically change the world we live in.

3. I don't know. We know that natural levels of CO2 in the atmosphere have fluctuated naturally for millions of years. I am sure there are chemists and other scientists that could probably address this, but i am not knowledgeable in the area.

4. I don't really wish to engage in talk of conspiracy theories.

5. You said 0.05 with no unit following. 0.05 = 5%. If you meant .05% you needed to include the (%). You said 11 years, not 30?

People deny climate change because corporate power wants it that way. Denyers are victims of brainwashing from a massive propaganda campaign aimed at desensitizing the general public on the issue of looming environmental catastrophe that powerful corporations (who fund policy and the media) want to brush under the rug.

Edit: it has nothing to do with stupidity.

I find that if it requires people to change their lifestyle or just requires change in general, they become very resistant and will say or do whatever they can to delay the inevitable. Especially corporations. If the fallout of not changing doesn't affect them but the generations after them, then they'd rather just let it be their problem. Society is very reactive rather than proactive.

As a Canadian, I live in a country run by someone who doesn't believe climate change is a thing, so...I don't know, ask Steven Harper?

DING. DING. DING.

This isn't exactly a tough one. It has nothing to do with religion or intelligence.

What makes the world go round? Answer: Money! So why would anyone deny climate change? Answer: Money! When in doubt, when it comes to politics, it always comes down to money.

Let's assume (as an example) the use of automobiles and gasoline are harmful to the environment. Most of highest revenue companies in the world are oil and gas. The last thing they want is for people to consume less of their product. So these companies purchase politicians through middle-men (lobbyists) to maintain the status quo and shoot down any laws that could damage their bottom-line. So... why deny climate change? Because trillions of dollars says so.

If you mean why do individual citizens deny it, I think it is lack of education mostly. I don't consider lack of education or religious beliefs to be synonymous with "low intelligence".

This.

And this.

As I said previously, very little to do with stupidity.

The majority of people will ignore the problem in hopes that it goes away

There appears to be people who believe if you cover your eyes and not see the gun aimed right at you, it doesn't exist. Ostrich behaviour, I think? It's scary how little the general public seems to be reacting to climate change. These people are more comfortable listening to those who claim this is not an issue with feeble "evidence", than it being an issue with credible evidence. Let's wait til the generation who caused the most damage dies away so we can attempt to fix this, or salvage our world best we can.

The answer is money, ultimately.

It's a conspiracy.

Because global warming experts tell us that that temperatures reaching the same height as they did 100 years ago must mean that something is going wrong

Because people are ignorant.

Because they can

Because people jelli of my factories, and don't like that I am making the big bucks by burning fossil fuel to power people's homes.

3. Nitrogen and Oxygen do not have any effect on global warming because they do not have a dipole moment. Because they are diatomic molecules (N2 and O2), the atoms in each molecule by definition exert an equal pull on the covalent electrons and thus neither molecule has a charge distribution. This prevents the molecule from having it's electrons excited by infrared radiation, curbing it's ability to absorb and remit infrared radiation as a consequence. CO2, meanwhile does have a dipole moment and thus can have the negative charge side of it's molecule more readily able to absorb and emit radiation spectra.

Also, to answer your question about the "why". Republicans don't want regulation of profitable energy business.

It's like admitting you f@cked up, you know how politicians feel about that.

Because it's an Inconvenient Truth.