Climate Change Conundrum

According to an article at ScienceDaily, Yale University's Dan Kahan has reported in the journal Political Psychology that Americans believe some fairly silly things about climate science.

That's no real surprise.

The surprise is that, among Americans who have more than average understanding of climate science, opinions as to the reality of man-made global warming are more divided than among Americans who don't understand the science.

Really?

This means that many Americans are adept at simultaneously believing two diametrically opposed ideas: 

• Humans are adding a lot of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. Adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere raises globally averaged surface temperature, sea level, and ocean acidity. These changes cause species extinctions, altered rainfall and temperature distributions, and other more or less permanent disasters.
• The climate is not changing. Or, if it is, it doesn't involve warming, increase of sea level, and increase of ocean acidity. Or, if it does, it isn't caused by human activity. Or, if it is, it's okay because we'll adapt.

This is a lot like a driver racing toward a cliff that he can't see because he forgot to put on his glasses. He puts them on, but keeps racing toward the cliff, even though he can now see it clearly, because he firmly believes that the cliff is not really there -- or, if it is, he won't fall off it -- or, if he does, he'll land in a soft pile of marshmallows. And the improved vision doesn't change his opinion.
 
The article points out that a lot of marketing money has been going into educating Americans to understand the science, and expecting that understanding to help them accept the reality of the problem and the need to do something about it.  Apparently, these efforts are not bearing much fruit, because those who don't want to believe in man-made global warming simply continue to disbelieve, even after they fully understand the science.

The last sentence in the article is tantalizing: "Kahan pointed to the success of local political leaders in southeast Florida in depoliticizing discussions of climate science, an example that is discussed at length in the study."

That has me really wondering: What did southeast Florida do and can we replicate it elsewhere? Unfortunately, I can't see Kahan's original article, because the two University libraries I have access to won't get it until next February. I hope I can remember to look it up then.