A survey by researchers at Yale and George Mason have found an oddity in a poll about climate change. The estimated percentage of Americans believing the planet is warming increased slightly over the past year, from 61% to 64%, while those believing that human activity is the cause decreased slightly, from 50% to 47%.
Most Americans are apparently unaware of the strong consensus among scientists that global warming is underway: only 39% agreed that “most scientists think global warming is happening,” and 40 percent agreed with the statement, “There is a lot of disagreement among scientists about whether or not global warming is happening.”
The oddity? The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is listed as the most trusted source of information at 76%, but, as the NYT’s Green Blog points out, the agency states unequivocally that the earth is warming and that human activity is a leading cause. But then there’s Rush Limbaugh saying that it’s like believing in Santa Claus.
I’m growing more cynical as I age. Less and less trusting of “research”. It seems that researchers have a financial interest in the task of researching so that it is in their own bests financial interests to have feed into the public one crisis or another.
I have no doubt we impact our world. The magnitude is debatable.
It seems we are Impacting the environment, in the US, less than we were in the 60′s yet we spend a horrific amount of money and effort saying we need to spend more and do more.