When it comes to media coverage of climate change, we still see occasional charges of “false balance,” despite the problem having been pretty much eradicated, as AP reporter Seth Borenstein pointed out during a panel discussion in 2011. That said, a legitimate example did occur last month when PBS inexplicably turned to Anthony Watts as a…Continue Reading…
The debate over climate change is well known for excesses on all sides. Those who claim that the issue is a hoax actually have a lot in common with those who see climate change in every weather extreme. The logic behind such tactics is apparently that a sufficiently scared public will support the political program…Continue Reading…
A blogger at Daily Kos rewinds back to the 1988 vice presidential debate and discovers that a question about global warming was posed to Dan Quayle about the the “Greenhouse Effect”: I guess that’s what they called it back then, before Global Warming and Climate Change became popular…There was no, do you think it is…Continue Reading…
At Slate, I have a short post that begins: The debate over genetically modified foods operates between two gradients: carnivalesque and politicized pseudoscience. I have some fun poking a stick at Bill Maher. I guess that makes me the David to his Goliath. Oh well. Enjoy.
We seem to be having a run of splashy, peer-reviewed GMO (genetically modified organism) studies that are of questionable merit. Several weeks ago, a team of French researchers published results that linked cancerous tumors in rats to the GM corn they were fed. But many scientists cast doubt on the study’s legitimacy almost immediately, and…Continue Reading…
I have a piece up at Slate called, “GMO Opponents are the Climate Skeptics of the Left.” It’s generated a fair amount of discussion at Slate and on twitter. So far, of all the people I lay into, only Tom Philpott of Mother Jones has engaged me (on twitter). I would love it if prestigious anti-GMO…Continue Reading…
When much of the United States was being hammered by drought and brutal heat waves this past summer, there were many media stories that made a climate change connection. The ugly weather and drought-related misery prompted a sarcastic headline from Time: Now Do You Believe in Global Warming? The sense in climate concerned circles was that…Continue Reading…
Two bits of climate news caught my attention today. One comes from Grist’s David Roberts, who says: Yikes: Avoiding dangerous climate change is still possible, but just barely. Whew. Good to hear us humans are still mathematically in the race to avert climate doom. But then I saw this article from ClimateWire, reporting: India is poised to…Continue Reading…
It’s always a curious thing when liberals become conservatives (or vice versa), and people do an about-face on climate change or atheism. You wonder what triggered the conversion. Was it a gradual shift, an existential crisis, or an epiphany? On individual issues, I wonder if it depends on how deeply you are invested in a given position….Continue Reading…
A continuing concern of climate science is the subject of a new paper in Nature: Thawing of Arctic permafrost could release significant amounts of carbon into the atmosphere in this century. When this issue last gurgled up to the media’s attention in late 2011 in sensationalist fashion, science journalism watcher Charlie Petit wrote that Andy Revkin provided…Continue Reading…