Pirate's Cove

Pretty much because weather happens, and sometimes it’s stronger than at other times

Many People Aren’t Connecting the Dots Between Climate Change and Extreme Weather

At the end of August, devastating floods and a debris flow triggered by a glacier collapse crashed through the valleys of Nepal, killing more than 1,300 people. Earlier this summer, deadly heat waves plagued much of the United States and Europe. Meanwhile, record-low snow levels and a long-term drought stoked wildfires across the western U.S.

It’s been a relentless summer of extremes—only the latest in a half-decade packed with record-breaking weather events. A growing body of research shows they’re becoming more frequent and severe as human-caused climate change accelerates.

Wait, I thought the science was settled all the way back in 2007? No?

But recent studies show that many people aren’t making this link in the wake of a weather disaster, a disconnect that could affect our ability to combat worsening warming. At the same time, a recent analysis found that fewer journalists are doing the kind of climate reporting that could help to close this gap. And even when hurricanes, wildfires or floods get widespread attention, it’s often not long before another story overwhelms the news cycle.

That sounds like political science, not science science. Maybe fewer journalists give a crap about the scam, and don’t see money in doing it.

For decades, scientists have been trying to grasp how people perceive extreme weather in the context of climate change. Dozens of studies, surveys and models seem to support only one consensus: It’s complicated.

“Most people do not automatically, intuitively, on their own, connect that event—a flood, a heat wave, a wildfire—to climate change,” Anthony Leiserowitz, the director of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, told me. “Climate change is still a relatively abstract idea for many, many people.”

Basically, they’re upset that people aren’t buying what they’re selling. I wonder why