Climate Change: Science or Marketing?

As if it were not a scientific issue, two United States university institutes have taken an opinion poll on climate change. A survey conducted through the Project on Climate Change Communication (Yale) and the Center for Climate Change Communication (George Mason) shows that a clear majority of North Americans (69 percent) attribute extreme weather phenomena observed in their country in the last few years to climate change. The prevailing opinion is that the abnormally high temperatures during the past winters and summers, massive snowstorms during the past two winters (an anomaly generally associated with the cold), and two other anomalies of opposite nature — the 2011 drought in Texas and Oklahoma, and the flooding of the Mississippi in the spring of the same year — are all due to the warming of the planet.

The weather has always been a topic of conversation, and not just in England. When something extraordinary happens, comments abound: “This summer’s heat is like nothing ever seen before,” or, “do you remember any other time with so little rain?”

But our memory is short, and these days we talk not just about the weather but also about the climate. They are not the same. We have to refer to the ephemerides of the weather agencies to verify what we remember. In the United States, NOAA offers easy access to information related to temperature and precipitation and to distinctive weather phenomena (droughts, hurricanes, etc.).

Certainly, in the continental United States, this year’s winter has been extraordinarily warm. The average temperature was 2.6º C, surpassed only by three recent years since 1895: 1992, 1999 and 2000. In the last two years, there was more snow than ever since the end of the 1970s. Both things can be due to warming of the planet, but the winters of the massive snowstorms did not contribute to it, as they were also very cold. With average temperatures of almost 5º C below zero (2009-2010) and 0º C (2010-2011), these years rank 15th and 37th coldest in the 117 years of records.

Doubts and Opinions

Climate data reveals an increase in average ground temperature in the last century. Its relation to other aspects of climate (precipitation, storms, etc.) is difficult to determine. In the United States, the frequency of tornados has grown since 1950. In contrast, hurricanes, droughts and snowstorms have not followed a clear trend.

“Climate science is complex,” said a journalist from the New York Times, which printed the recent survey. To this he added a touch of irony: “Scientists may have doubts about relating the extreme weather phenomena of the past few years with climate change, but it seems the public sees it clearly.”*

There are many doubts among scientists, and not just in this camp. Does the Higgs boson really exist? A thorough survey costs a great deal of money, but it will always be more economical than a large hadron collider. However, the aspiration of climatologists and, more broadly, scientists, is to discover the truth. It is not to have public opinion in their favor.

The poll from the two universities presents questions to people that specialists cannot solve with certainty, such as the influence of global climate change in the thermal anomaly of the past North American winter, or in the latest floods of the Mississippi basin. There are some questions too general to allow for a scientific response: “How strongly do you agree with the following statement? Global warming is affecting the weather in the United States.” Others are clarified without asking for public opinion, instead referring to the NOAA records: “Have each of the following types of extreme weather events become more or less common in your local area over the past few decades…?”

There are, finally, original questions in the survey: “If you pay attention to the weather forecasts; if you have suffered personal or property damage by some extreme phenomenon; if you fear natural disasters and have protected yourself against them.” But it is clear that the issues that can be subject to an opinion poll are unscientific.

The motive of this single poll is better understood while taking into account that it was done by two separate institutes from two universities: the Project on Climate Change Communication (Yale) and the Center for Climate Change Communication (George Mason). The first defines its objectives as such: “1) Advance public understanding and engagement with climate change science and solutions; and, 2) Catalyze action by the general public and leaders of government, business, academia and the media through improved knowledge and understanding.”

In the end, this institute has come to be a public relations office for climate change, like those of big businesses, political parties, and all those who need to sell their image. In the matter of global warming, science is not the only dominant field of inquiry. There is also plenty of marketing.

*Editor’s note: the original quotation, accurately translated, could not be verified.