The Rise of the Cool Skeptics

Off the back of that documentary (see previous post) Channel 4 received 758 calls and emails, with those in favour of the documentary outnumbering those complaining about it by six to one. With the documentary receiving that support in this country, one that I personally believe to be quite well scientifically grouded, it made me wonder the effects of global warming denial in America - somewhere that can often give the impression, despite being one of the world leaders, to be a bit behind the times.

I want to start just by looking at the general attitudes of American citizens toward to issue of global warming. To do so, I went to Gallup, an American research based company, famous for their public opinion polls. Their most recent poll towards the attitudes towards global warming was posted on April 22 of this year. I'll use this graph to briefly explain the three categories that the American citizens can be split into...

Concerned Believers: these attribute global warming (correctly) to human activity and contribution, they believe CO2 is driving the greenhouse effect.

Cool Skeptics: These are at the other end of the spectrum. They are not worried about the effect that humans are having on global warming and attribute the changes to natural causes (alike The Great Global Warming swindle)

Mixed Middle: Lie somewhere between the two groups

Alarmingly we can see in this graph the trends don't go exactly the way we want! The number of people not caring about global warming is increasing and the number of believers has decreased, however it has just reached the percentage it was at 14 years ago, showing no real progress. Over the next few weeks we will be exploring the reasons behind the "Cool Skeptics" stemming back from the 1970s and I'll be able to piece together a political timeline for America, in terms of global warming, for an easily accessible summary of the last 30 years!