Let's not ascribe 'stupidity' to either "side" of a debate/conversation.

psychoak, I think you missed the point of Jafo's last reply. Not to worry, I am certain he will clarify it for you.

Intelligent? Highly educated? Well, that's a subjective evaluation, but one thing is certain about the climate change deniers - they are either misinformed, or have difficulties accepting facts they do not like. 

Because in scientific world, there is no controversy, no debate, no "fence" as you call it about the issue. The debate is over. The evidence is conclussive. The climate change is happening and humans are major contributing factor. 

It's similar to the debate about the heliocentric system. Giordano Bruno's proof was very clear - in fact so clear that the catholic church felt the need to "remove" its author by burning him at stake. But it took centuries to church adherents to admit he was right. Why? Well, most of the people did not really understand the proof itself, or astronomy, or anything, but one thing was important - it contradicts the Bible, and Bible was the most important element of their belief, so in their mind, Bible was right, so Bruno must have been wrong. 

There is a similarity today. Climate change deniers do not understand the science behind it, nor they are familiar with the empiric evidence supporting it. If they did, they could not maintain their position. True scientists today cannot, because you cannot be both a respectable scientist and brush off uncomfortable facts at the same time. The deniers, however, understand one thing - the fact of the climate change phenomenon invalidates their beliefs about the superiority of the unregulated free market, about how supply and demand itself fixes everything, about the so called "Invisible Hand" and other stories. But this free market ideology, similar to Bible before, is what they define themselves with, so they percept it in fact as an attack against their world, their belief systems, and deny it. To support their position, they invent ridiculous leaps of logic and misinterpreted facts just so that they can keep telling themselves "I am right, and they are wrong."

Sorry, but there is nothing intelligent nor educated about this behavior. I reserve those adjectives to those who really deserve them - to true scientists who always put facts and solid proofs first and who are not afraid to discard whole theories the moment they are proven wrong. 

This article sums it up:

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/ulterior-motives/201305/who-rejects-evidence-global-climate-change

Actually no. 'Misinformed' is not the same as 'stupid'.  Educated, intelligent people CAN be misinformed.  The two are not mutually exclusive....

I'm skeptical on AGW and I'm neither misinformed nor ignorant.  

Corbett Report Radio 199 -- Global Warming Hysteria

I believe everything that can be said has been said by both sides.

Resurrecting this post after nearly a month of inactivity can only be deemed as stirring-the-pot and not to inform anyone of anything new.

Resurrecting this post after nearly a month of inactivity can only be deemed as stirring-the-pot and not to inform anyone of anything new.

Or what a significant number of climate scientists know as well.   The Oregon petition has over 31,000 signatures - all scientists.  The studies that showed either that 97% agreed with AGW were statistically flawed (the actual percentage is .7% - 75 of 10,257) - http://tigger.uic.edu/~pdoran/012009_Doran_final.pdf

Or, the "study" which claimed that 97% of Climate papers supported the conclusion, consisted of gross malfeasance on the part of the authors (Cook, Nuccitelli) - http://www.populartechnology.net/2013/05/97-study-falsely-classifies-scientists.html

Now some may not like my links or my sites.  But I would direct you to the claims of the actual authors of the papers that Cook & Nuccitelli classified the papers wrong (on the links provided), and from one Climate Scientists (who is a believer in AGW) who showed that even his calculations on the mis-classified papers is wrong (it was 98%, not 97%).

Real science is not done by consensus or appeal to Authority.  So neither saying that "most believe" or that So and So believes is a valid point in science.  The data, love it or hate it, are all that matters.  And right now, the data does not support any definitive conclusion. Period.

Well and succinctly said.  Bravo.

You mean it isn't?  

"Do you believe in world peace?" is the line I seem to get.

Hankers is correct......well partly correct. 

There haven't just been the 'two sides of AGW' discussed here.  Some of us have also posted about our life philosophies as they relate to the environment which to me anyway, is the part of this thread which is most interesting.  I mean in the end does it really matter that we 'chose a side' in the AGW debate?  Have we 'won' anything in doing so?  Have we proven anything to anyone else or ourselves?  Have we made a difference to the environment either way?

To me what matters are the individual choices we make, and if they can be deemed generally responsible or not.  The choices I happen to make (and which I've posted about on previous pages in this thread) are not motivated by choosing this or that side in this debate.  The choices I make in my life are made to be responsible to myself, my family, my neighborhood, community, society.....etc. etc.

To me, the larger 'debate' surrounding this topic matter serves as 'noise' ( pro AGW vs anti AGW etc. etc.), when the real and only question we should be asking ourselves each day is whether we have dispensed with the resources we claim in a responsible way, have we treated our environment in a responsible way, have we treated each other in a responsible way?

As much as some love to argue, I believe the word responsible requires no explanation/quantification nor any 'professional' or authoritative qualification.  Each and every one of us knows whether we have been responsible or not in any given situation.....and no....I am not a fan of Kool-Aid. 

Sorry to say, but your reactions are really proving my original premise rather than refuting it - the defensive, flock behavior, the attempts to interpret my contribution as a personal attack, the tactic of making the question a political, moral or religious issue. Some people even go as far as mentioning the Oregon petition, which was not really relevant even by the time it was signed (1998), much less 15 years later, as some of the people who signed it admit themselves.  

But the subject of the climate change is not a religious,political, moral or philosophical question, it's not like asking "Is it okay to eat animal meat" or "is there a God"?

The climate change is an observed phenomenon, much like sunset or gravity, and therefore it is measurable and provable or refutable. There are really two main questions concerning the problem:

1) Is it happening? 

The answer is - yes, it is happening, the evidence is overwhelming, well documented and conclusive. If you don't know or believe this, please read something on the subject. The following link is a nice summary, but I encourage you to look up any relevant, cited scientific study from the last 5 years

http://climate.nasa.gov/evidence

2) Are humans the primary cause?

Well, the natural causes can explain the speed and the intensity of the change, that much is proven. And the study from the last year changed the mind of most of the sceptics among the scientists (97 percent of climate scientists now acknowledge humans are the primary cause of the ongoing change)

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2012/jul/29/climate-change-sceptics-change-mind

There really is no controversy, or baricade between adherents and sceptics in the scientific worls, as Jafo has tried to put it:

http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/8/2/024024

The barricade, it seems, remains around those who still failed to get informed and/or accept the recent scientific findings on the subject, built by their very own hands. 

So, do you "have to believe"? Absolutely not, science is not a theocratic regime, it merely presents results and findings. Everyone can believe what he/she wants, that's one of the basic human rights. After all, there was a case of a school teacher tried at court for teaching evolution theory in school as late as 1925, so that proves even large groups of people (and especially large groups of people) can resist the progress of scientific knowledge very successfully.

But it seems to me (and that's my subjective impression only), that saying: "I am an informed and open-minded individual, but I refuse the recent scientific findings in selected areas, where I prefer to believe what I like for some reason" is quite ridiculous. People practice this Orwellian "double think" every day in many areas, but this topic is special because it makes it so blatantly obvious. 

The truly intellectually honest person would have to ask: "What drives me to cling to a refuted system of beliefs?" and would search for the answer within his/her own mind - and who knows, perhaps he/she would find something worth the effort and pain.