Arctic sea ice -- in pre-election perceptions

As longtime ASIB readers may know, my colleagues and I have been tracking US public perceptions of Arctic change. This started with analysis of questions written by others for the nationwide General Social Survey in 2006 and 2010, then shifted to our own questions placed on another nationwide survey in 2011, and a continuing series of statewide New Hampshire surveys since then. Results have been highlighted in several posts here by Neven (June 2015, August 2013, April 2013) that refer to some of the underlying research articles. Our most recent article, “Polar facts in the age of polarization,” in Polar Geography, is a good source for question wording, analysis and citations to earlier work (write if you want a copy). Figure 1 below updates one of the graphs from that paper, adding data through September 2015.

Figure 1

Our sea ice question reads as follows:

Which of the following three statements do you think is more accurate?  
Over the past few years, the ice on the Arctic Ocean in late summer ...
    Covers less area than it did 30 years ago.
    Declined but then recovered to about the same area it had 30 years ago.
    Covers more area than it did 30 years ago.
    don’t know/no answer

The top line in Figure 1 tracks the percentage of “less area” responses on surveys from June 2011 to September 2015. A red triangle at far left shows the corresponding percentage from a nationwide survey in 2011, which came in quite close to New Hampshire.

Most respondents, around 65 to 75 percent, knew or guessed correctly that ice area has decreased. What about the rest? Sometimes wrong answers are as interesting as the right ones. The Polar Geography paper showed that right answers on sea ice have a strong political pattern. Figure 2 approaches this from a different direction, tracking who mistakenly thinks that Arctic sea ice has recovered.

Figure 2

New Hampshire is a small state (1.3 million people) that briefly achieves notoriety every four years due to its first-in-the-nation presidential primary elections. Residents bask in the attention of presidential candidates appearing at countless small local events, and pollsters phoning every other evening to ask who we are going to vote for. Some people regard such polls as a nuisance, although personally I relish the chance to have my “vote” counted many times.

One such telephone poll (that did not call me) took place last month from September 17 to 23. This poll, sponsored by WMUR-TV and CNN, was conducted by the Survey Center at the University of New Hampshire. It included questions testing hypothetical matches between Donald Trump (the Republican front-runner) and three possible Democratic candidates — Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden. Each question had this form:

Suppose the 2016 presidential election was being held today and the candidates were Donald Trump, the Republican, and Hillary Clinton, the Democrat, who would you vote for?
    Trump
    Clinton
    other
    don’t know/undecided

Coincidentally, the same poll carried our question about Arctic sea ice.

Since the hypothetical voting and Arctic sea ice questions were on the same poll, I was curious to see what happens if you cross them. The answer is in Figure 3. The upper panel simply shows the Trump/Clinton match, 42% to 50% in this survey. The lower panel shows that 45 percent of Trump supporters compared with 85 percent of Clinton supporters knew or guessed correctly that late-summer Arctic sea ice in recent years covered less area than it did 30 years ago.

Figure 3

While Clinton led Trump in this poll (50% to 42%), the other Democrats fared somewhat better (Sanders over Trump 57% to 37%; Biden over Trump 56% to 37%). In all three cases, there was a strong partisan pattern in sea ice beliefs — gaps of 35 to 40 points between supporters of Trump and each Democrat.

Comments

[Jai Mitchell]

this only proves the long-standing view that Republican voters are low-information types who tend to vote against their own interests.

I would suspect that nearly any similar poll, with appropriate cross-tabs would show that republican voters are chock full of misinformation/disinformation propaganda being pushed on them by a myopic and ideologically incestual right-wing media and radio personality goebbles' fest.

[VaughnA]

Jai, great wordsmithing; I can't agree with you more. I read some of their crock-o-babble to stay current with their "disinformation propaganda" and sometimes post some clear evidence from our sources used on this blog. Hopefully we can constrain more of this pallyandering before it completely hits critical mass.

[Tim]

I am all for badmouthing Republicans as morons who have nursed at the teat of an execrable right wing propaganda machine because it is undoubtedly true. I do it ALL the time. Unfortunately, before I conclude that "my side" has come to the correct conclusions for the right reasons (i.e., because they are heavily supported by the evidence, the real evidence), you need a some questions that measure similar unscientific attitudes amongst my liberal friends. Try conversing with some liberals about genetically modified foods, for example.

So far, there are three aspects of the current 'age of polarization' in the US, at least, that make the right much worse than the left. (1) The GOP is much more controlled by extremists than the left (extreme leftists are virtually nonexistent in the US), (2) The Democratic party will allow for much more deviation from their orthodoxies. Not so in the GOP: they have driven people who accept the scientific consensus on climate change to virtual extinction in the GOP (anyone remember Jon Huntsman?) and now even people who accept the theory of evolution keep their mouths shut and allow that we should 'teach the controversy', and (3) there are no visible GOP office holders who aren't thoroughly corrupted by money (not that there are a lot among the Democrats).

[Wall V Erine]

Nothing proves that you morons are so dumb as the 3 comments on this page.
You guys wouldn't know science if it bit you in the ass...

You are really good at confirmation bias though.

[Wall V Erine]

But it is good to know at least you'll never move the polls with those attitudes.

[Wall V Erine]

@Tim,

1) The extreme leftists are already in power and have been since about 1988. There's nothing unradical about opening our borders, 800 billion dollar deficits, 105% debt to GDP ratios.

2) There are plenty of pro-evolution Republicans. It's really barely an issue except fringe groups. Mainly because there are important issues for the religious right to battle now.

3) You fail to see how the appearance of corruption is what undermines AGW credibility.

But it's great, until you stop insulting the opposition, you're never going to change their mind... You keep throwing fuel on the flames of polarization.

[Wall V Erine]

@jai,

How is it in their interest to vote for unlimited immigration into the USA? Because the immigrants will vote for Democrats?

You should really stick to your Climastrology... at least sometimes you sound reasonable.

[VaughnA]

Wall, in my world when a person calls another person a name like you mention, the reality is that the sayer of the name is in all actuality saying that about himself or herself. Just saying....

(Neven please delete this comment if you wish.)

[Fufufunknknk]

I think the problem is much more simple than or subtle than the GOP morons. That part of the party is easy to dismiss. The intention of the denialists is not to get anyone to believe their nonsense, it is to provide plausible reasons for not taking action. Or, more subtly, to let people who have busy lives convince themselves that the issue can wait just a little longer while they take their kids, to school, pay down the mortgage, etc.

I see this in my mother and my sister who both hate the GOP. When it comes to global warming, they say well the evidence is in the middle and hope that new technology will rescue us and in the mean time they can't afford electric cars, solar panels, etc. I try to tell them that there are lots of things they can do without spending money (call congressmen, write letters, dry their laundry on a line, etc) but the fact is, having bought into a line of reasoning to not do anything major, they are forced to extend that line to cover all parts of their life, e.g. they cannot admit that drying their clothes outside helps because they have already conceded the opint that it is ok to wait (don't even get me started on how much easier and nicer it is to dry clothes outside (leaving socks out of it)).

Off topic: personally I wish they would allow the debate about intelligent design but extend it all the way to aliens, etc. There is no need for a god to create life, just a decent engineer with a solid background in biology and chemistry...

[Magma]

@ Tim (post #3): this discussion came up on ATTP and was convincingly answered by Hamilton in the comments section with reference to other work.

https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2015/09/30/guest-post-the-elephant-in-the-room/

[jdallen_wa]

1) The extreme leftists are already in power and have been since about 1988. There's nothing unradical about opening our borders, 800 billion dollar deficits, 105% debt to GDP ratios.

Wall V Erine, this is an utterly absurd assertion, followed by nonsequiteurs.

2) There are plenty of pro-evolution Republicans. It's really barely an issue except fringe groups. Mainly because there are important issues for the religious right to battle now.

Absolutely! Unfortunately, they are not the ones driving the direction the party is taking. I very much disagree with your characterization of the religious right as "fringe" in the Republican party; it has been actively targeting the Republican party since the early 80's, and now *easily* constitutes 30% of the party's membership.

(a site here with a quick historical timeline: http://theocracywatch.org/taking_over.htm)

I'm afraid that fails the qualifier of "fringe". Presuming you are yourself a party member, I'd say you have a rather challenging problem facing you.

3) You fail to see how the appearance of corruption is what undermines AGW credibility.

Bushwa!

We fail to see nothing here. AGW has been actively and persistently attacked via propaganda for decades. The appearance of corruption is well known and a monstrous fabrication repeated exhaustively in media to create the appearance of truth (a variation on fallacy ad nauseum). We see things quite clearly thank you.

But it's great, until you stop insulting the opposition, you're never going to change their mind... You keep throwing fuel on the flames of polarization.

Here I will have to agree with you in principle. To my fellow commentators here, I'd counsel restraint; there is actually very good social science examining the mechanisms behind climate denialism which suggests exactly this - that confrontational approaches to dialog only harden people's positions and do not lead to effective change. Here's a pretty good play book for arguing our points from people who deal with the problem constantly:

http://coast.noaa.gov/digitalcoast/_/pdf/CRED_Psychology_Climate_Change_Communication.pdf?redirect=301ocm

That said, Wall V Erine, I'd suggest you take your own advice; while it may be gratifying to toss insults back into the face of people you disagree with, it rarely leads to a productive dialog. In short, don't surrender to the impulse to engage in exactly what you are criticizing.

[BDS]

how do you think the polling would have come out if the question had been about Antarctic sea ice? I'm sure a question could have been created that would have resulted in just as many incorrect answers in the Clinton voter camp. I'm sure you could have crafted any number of questions about other hot political topics - and depending on how you crafted them - you would have gotten equally wrong answers on both sides of the aisle.

[L. Hamilton]

I'm sure you could have crafted any number of questions about other hot political topics - and depending on how you crafted them - you would have gotten equally wrong answers on both sides of the aisle.

Of course you can craft "gotcha" questions slanted in any direction, but we're aiming for basic relevant facts, not tricky polling. An even more basic question on our most recent surveys asked whether atmospheric CO2 is increasing, with results similar to the Arctic ice one above.
https://twitter.com/CarseySchool/status/651074638185918468/photo/1

There is more detailed analysis of which polar questions have political predictors in our Polar Geography paper mentioned in the post.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1088937X.2015.1051158?journalCode=tpog20#.VhQDgCvzVpU

Many drivers of polar-region change originate in mid-latitude industrial societies, so public perceptions there matter. Building on earlier surveys of US public knowledge and concern, a series of New Hampshire state surveys over 2011–2015 tracked public knowledge of some basic polar facts. Analysis indicates that these facts subjectively fall into two categories: those that are or are not directly connected to beliefs about climate change. Responses to climate-linked factual questions, such as whether Arctic sea ice area has declined compared with 30 years ago, are politicized as if we were asking for climate-change opinions. Political divisions are less apparent with factual questions that do not suggest climate change, such as whether the North Pole is on land or sea ice. Only 38% of respondents could answer that question correctly, and even fewer (30%) knew or guessed correctly that melting of Greenland and Antarctic land ice, rather than Arctic sea ice, could potentially do the most to raise sea levels. At odds with the low levels of factual knowledge, most respondents say they have a moderate amount or a great deal of understanding about climate change. A combination of low knowledge with high self-assessed understanding characterizes almost half our sample and correlates with political views. The low knowledge/high understanding combination is most prevalent among Tea Party supporters, where it reaches 61%. It also occurs often (60%) among people who do not believe climate is changing. These results emphasize that diverse approaches are needed to communicate about science with people having different configurations of certainty and knowledge.

[BDS]

asking whether or not ice extent in Antarctica is increasing/decreasing/staying the same is by no means a "gotcha" question. it is just crafted to expose the ignorance of one group of people rather than another.

[Jai Mitchell]

What this shows is that any relevant topic that is cross tabbed with political ideology, in EVERY POLL shows that those who vote consistently on the right live in a virtual reality, with little critical thought or even common sense, prone to urban myths and groupthink and exhibiting classical psychological denial of facts to justify and reinforce their own maladjusted world view. ESPECIALLY WITH REGARD TO CLIMATE CHANGE.

for example:

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/lkmdal/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-fox-news--false-statements

[Hans Gunnstaddar]

Great post, Jai.

The thing with the right wing in my opinion is there ability to march to the same tune. Some topic gets crunched and once their leaders on radio and DC put something into a neat and tidy black and white super easy to understand (even if it's dead wrong) box, their FOLLOWERS tow the line. How people can simply turn off their own capability for critical thinking and etch in blanks in their brain verbatim, would make for a great psychological study. And once they have etched something into their gray matter we can be sure it must require their leaders to talk them down to etch something to replace it. Maybe we should call them Etchi-Sketch brains with their leaders controlling the vertical and horizontal.

[Joshua]

==> "The low knowledge/high understanding combination is most prevalent among Tea Party supporters, where it reaches 61%."

Interesting. I assume you've seen these?:

https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/q74.jpg?w=500&h=325

https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/q54.jpg?w=500&h=325

[Joshua]

And this:

https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2011/10/q54cum.jpg?w=500&h=325

From here:

https://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/10/09/survey-says-2/

And Lawrence -

Do you have any thoughts about that blip on your 2nd graph in 2014?

[L. Hamilton]

Thank Joshua, I had not seen those Tamino graphs. I've definitely seen the same pattern in our own data (as has Tony Leiserowitz in his, IIRC). From "A four-party view of US environmental concern"
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09644016.2014.976485?journalCode=fenp20

Research on US public concern about environmental issues finds ideology or political party are the most consistent background predictors. Party is commonly defined by three groups: Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. Here, using statewide New Hampshire survey data, we elaborate this approach to distinguish a fourth group: respondents who say they support the Tea Party movement. On 8 out of 12 science- or environment-related questions, Tea Party supporters differ significantly from non–Tea Party Republicans. Tea Party supporters are less likely than non–Tea Party Republicans to trust scientists for information about environmental issues, accept human evolution, believe either the physical reality or the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change, or recognise trends in Arctic ice, glaciers, or CO2. Despite factual gaps, Tea Party supporters express greater confidence in their own understanding of climate change. Independents, on the other hand, differ less from non–Tea Party Republicans on most of these questions—although Independents do more often accept the scientific consensus on climate change. On many science and environmental questions, Republicans and Tea Party supporters stand farther apart than Republicans and Independents.

[L. Hamilton]

As for the 2014 blip in Arctic ice "recovery," that was briefly the meme in some circles, although based on a 2-year instead of 30-year time frame.

[bobcobb]

Fufufunknknk,
There's not much more that can be done politically than what's being done already to advance climate change action in the U.S. unless people elect Democrats in both houses and the presidency. That's just the reality of it. The only way to have a shot at changing the minds of the masses is if the Democrats choose to make it an election issue and/or the media reports it.

[Fufufunknknk]

Bobcobb

That is why I am really rooting for the ice to fail next summer. While I realize that by the time the election comes around, the ice will have 'come back' etc., if it goes low enough it could serve to force the environment into play as a major issue. Even if the Republicans win the presidency, they may be forced to acknowledge the environment in way they wouldn't in a non election year.

But my point was that the anti-environment rhetoric is much more subtle than the lunatic right wing arguments. Those arguments don't need to be won, or at least the followers of those arguments are not the people that need to be convinced. The people who need to be convinced are the moderate republicans.

If moderate republicans politicians can be given political cover to act, then they will. I think they do not now because the GOP has been so hijacked they are scared to act.

[Philip Cohen]

Going back to Tim's post: a fourth reason why the right is so much worse than the left is that their party's delusions about climate are far more dangerous than Democrats' delusions about GMOs or vaccines or whatever.

[Remko Kampen]

"... that confrontational approaches to dialog only harden people's positions and do not lead to effective change."

Heard that one to tiresomely many times. Grab your chance now and analyse the opposite for me. How did polite approach work? How did Al Gore do?

My conclusion is years old already. Only confrontation teaches the lesson, though even then its hard. But nothing helps better than a Sandy or a millenium flooding (this time, North Carolina). Even then thick skull remain thick.

If nothing else is to be had from a public that will Dunning-Kruger with pride all the time, then it's amusement. So confront & kick and enjoy while the mayhem increases everywhere.
It's really fun to go 'Burn!' adressed at the people of SE Australia while they burn once more, just early at the hottest start of October ever. They helped Abbott to office, I say ha ha, burn!
Because there's nothing else to be had from it.

[Ibvarady]

Meanwhile it is election time in Canada - October 19. Canada-third highest emitter per capita of greenhouse gas,or 2% of total by .5% of world population. Oil reserves 2nd only to Saudi Arabia
Prime minister of ten years is Stephen Harper.
Stephen Harper-Republican Tea Party Puppy, Australian Tony Abbot's envy, Imperial Oil mail room clerk only real world job held,son of Imperial accountant (Imperial is Exxon's Canadian subsidiary), anti-Muslim, religion based socially conservative motives Warmonger
Withdrew Canada from Kyoto Accord
Reduced protection of lakes and rivers from 1 million plus to just 89
Allows only witnesses with financial interest to testify before environmental assessment hearings (eg. pipeline proposals such as Keystone)
Heavily subsidizes oil/tar sands extraction
Labelled environmental groups as terrorists.
Major proponent of military action in the middle East.
Took us to war in Libya, Iraq, Syria.

Anyway, that's the short list.

Brett

[jdallen_wa]

It's really fun to go 'Burn!' adressed at the people of SE Australia while they burn once more, just early at the hottest start of October ever. They helped Abbott to office, I say ha ha, burn!
Because there's nothing else to be had from it.

Remko - while gratifying, I'm afraid it's not effective. I'm not saying don't do it; just don't expect anything else positive to come out of it. (I find it to be especially problematic when dealing with relations and friends...)

I've had much better results with socratic/non-confrontational approaches. A really key element of that for me has been to disconnect the politics from the science. The next key element is to keep following up to prevent people from falling back into the same pattern - basically not letting their confirmation bias take back control.

So, for me its been one individual at a time, not just persuading them, but turning them into active proponents of climate action, doing some of what I do.

It's not as satisfying as sarcasm or derision. Its hard, and requires (frequently) near infinite patience, but I think its what will work.

[Pete Williamson]

Lawerence,
I think your rushing to dismiss BDS's question about Antarctic ice question as a "gotcha" question.
There's one thing to ask a question and analyse the data and then there is a separate question to come to a conclusion that the answer comes from ignorance/dis-information/political bias. You should be really happy to test that conclusion.
BDS's question has the potential to do that. For example Clinton supporters answers might just be matching reality because their political belief is humanity is screwing up the planet and the arctic data seems to confirm that. The Antarctic question would test whether they really do have knowledge of the climate rather than then knee-jerking about human impact on the environment.
It's not that I particularly think Clinton's supporters are an more or less irrational than GOPers (although Tim makes an intersesting points with respect GMOs) but researchers should always be prepared to test their conclusions/assumptions.

[Joshua]

Pete -

==> "although Tim makes an intersesting points with respect GMOs"

Unfortunately, Tim's point about GMOs is purely anecdotal and most of the data I've seen show that there is no significant divergence of view on GMOs associated with "liberal" or "conservative" orientation, respectively. To the extent that I have seen data that suggest otherwise, it was provided by Lawrence...and those data he provides suggest that it is "conservatives" who are more likely to question what scientists have to say about the topic:

https://carsey.unh.edu/publication/views-of-science

[Martin Gisser]

Alas I'm with Remko. All you can effectively tell the boneheads is "burn!" "drown!" "shrivel!". And don't be afraid of "bullshit!". Evidence based communication. Massaging their egos does not help and is a waste of words. Heck, this is 2015.

[bobcobb]

I'm with jdalien. That type of rhetoric is on par with climate denier saying global warming is a good thing.

[John Christensen]

bobcobb said:

"There's not much more that can be done politically than what's being done already to advance climate change action in the U.S. unless people elect Democrats in both houses and the presidency."

I wouldn't be so sure about that: Who just signed for having more heavy ice breakers in the Arctic?

Knowing doesn't mean doing anything good..

I read an article in National Geographic in July about a certain kind of people.. The kind of people, who don't believe in Darwin, who don't believe man has been on the Moon, or who don't believe in man-made Global Warming.
Although I could follow the article most of the way it seemed very hollow given that the same issue of the National Geographic had a competition with prizes taking you around the world on a photo safari, or the adds for turist excursions to the Antarctic, or the insanely expensive custom excursions you can make with the NG.

Seems like they know, but they behave as if they didn't..

And that seems to happen a lot.

[L. Hamilton]

asking whether or not ice extent in Antarctica is increasing/decreasing/staying the same is by no means a "gotcha" question. it is just crafted to expose the ignorance of one group of people rather than another.

Actually, a question "crafted to expose the ignorance of one group of people" is pretty much the definition of a "gotcha" question, and yes you could slant those in any direction. I don't.

While learning that some major factual questions (e.g., Arctic ice, CO2) elicit strong partisan responses, we've also identified other similarly major questions (e.g., is N Pole on land or sea ice? South Pole?) that get lots of wrong answers in a non-partisan way, and used those to construct a very simple, politically-neutral polar knowledge scale. How that scale behaved was a key finding of the Polar Geography paper.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1088937X.2015.1051158?journalCode=tpog20

[L. Hamilton]

Democrats' delusions about GMOs or vaccines or whatever.

Somewhat off topic but since this point has come up several times in the comments -- as Magma and Joshua noted above, we've done several recent surveys testing whether conservative rejection of science on climate change and evolution has a mirror image in liberal rejection of science on GMOs, vaccines or nuclear power. The evidence so far has been that conservatives are less inclined to trust scientists on all of these topics; there's no sign of the liberal mirror image.

For the short version, see this graphic:
http://www.unh.edu/news/releases/2015/08/images/img-7TS2_Figure4.png

More about where that came in this not-paywalled report:
http://scholars.unh.edu/carsey/252/

Those are New Hampshire surveys. Another survey from Oregon (also not paywalled):
http://sgo.sagepub.com/content/5/3/2158244015602752

[BDS]

Are you serious? Somehow asking a question about the Arctic Sea Ice is a question about "basic relevant facts" (your words) yet a question about Antarctic Sea Ice is the definition of a "gotcha" question?

I think I understand where you are coming from now.....

[John Christensen]

L. Hamilton,

The behavior of the conservatives is politically motivated..

Conservatives often argue that scientists also are politically motivated.

And anyone who cares from a purely scientific perspective can find many examples that the behavior of scientists is politically motivated as well.

Try polling people with a degree in 'climatology' to see how they vote.

The conservative argument would be that people chose to study climatology because of their political views and then use it to reinforce their political values.

This is how I got interested in studying the Ice - I want to know for myself.

[Jai Mitchell]

Arctic vs. Antarctic question

The reason that this is an idiotic discussion is because it requires a complete lack of scientific understanding to even ask it.

There is no parallel between the SUMMER arctic sea ice loss (when there was previously significant ice all summer long) and the SUMMER (cold temperature) Antarctic ice gain.

The reason for this is that the summer months has absolutely no sunshine in Antarctica. Therefore, there is no albedo effect. However in the summer in the arctic the loss of sea ice so far has contributed 20% of the current global warming effect due to increased absorption of the ocean with less reflection caused by less sea ice.

In addition, the WINTER antarctic sea ice has always been non-existent. So to compare warm season to warm season is impossible.

Finally, the SUMMER antarctic sea ice extent values are caused by shifts in winds and due to the warming of the circumpolar deep water, melting the ice shelves from below, causing cold fresh water to rise to the surface and is therefore a NATURAL effect of Global Warming.

That is why it is an idiotic question to ask in the first place.

[L. Hamilton]

Are you serious? Somehow asking a question about the Arctic Sea Ice is a question about "basic relevant facts" (your words) yet a question about Antarctic Sea Ice is the definition of a "gotcha" question?

No, I said that questions "crafted to expose the ignorance of one group of people rather than another" (your words) is the definition of gotcha. And you gave those words as your rationale for the Antarctic question.

I think I understand where you are coming from now.....

Don't think so. Did you read the abstract?

[D]

FishOutofWater here...

So, BDS, how does the 2015 Antarctic sea ice extent differ from the 1981 to 2010 mean curve?

How have changes in winds and ocean currents affecting sea ice extent in the last 5 years? How does increasing Antarctic glacier melting affect the global thermohaline circulation? What is happening in the Weddell Sea?

These aren't gotcha questions, but I don't expect the general public to know the answers.

As to the right wing troll, the accusations of corruption have been pretty effective in diverting attention from the *real corruption* which involves very self interested individuals such as the Koch Bros. buying up politicians and think thanks to spread disinformation and pass legislation for personal gain.

The basics of global warming were known long before it became a political issue. The denial of climate change by English speaking politicians is the direct result of the corruption of politics by fossil fuel interests.

[Artful Dodger]

Hi Jai,

Well stated, though it may be better to specify that "the [Northern] summer months has absolutely no sunshine in Antarctica. Therefore, there is no albedo effect."

Indeed the real issue in Antarctica (which deniers prefer you ignore), is the loss of land ice, not sea ice. This is hardly surprising, since Antarctica is continental land surrounded by ocean, the reverse of the Arctic.

Still, climate deniers much prefer that you cluck'n'peck around the barnyard, all the while ignoring the 'Elephant' in the coop. So click the image if you're not chicken:

For more never-ending GObstoPer fun, see the lecture-video from Denial101x - Making Sense of Science Denial

Cheers,
Lodger

[G man]

As this a poll where are the error bars? This looks to me a poll where someone/group with a bias goes looking for confirmation.

[G man]

@ AD [Indeed the real issue in Antarctica (which deniers prefer you ignore), is the loss of land ice, not sea ice.]
Depends on which science you prefer. NASAs Jay Zwally ICESat laser altimetry and Frezzotti et al 2012 which used 67 data sets spanning most of the continent. Both o show increases in mass balance of the Antarctic ice sheet. To be fair if you read the literature there is huge uncertainty in all methods especially GRACE which has calibration issues and is seen by many ice researchers as an outlier

[L. Hamilton]

As this a poll where are the error bars?

Do-it-yourself approximation for 95% confidence interval of a percentage:
+/- 100/sqrt(n)
where n is the number of observations. So if you have 60% in a survey of 400 people, the confidence interval should be about +/-100/sqrt(400) = +/-5 points.

Confidence intervals (calculated more precisely) are drawn for all data points in Figure 1 above. They would make Figure 2 unreadable, but if you wanted to work the overall values out just for fun, we have D 5%, I 7%, R 13%, T 24%, based on 3,795 interviews (design-based F test p < 0.001).

Figure 3 shows just the most recent poll, 705 interviews, so you can work out confidence intervals from that. Again, design-based F test p < 0.001.

This looks to me a poll where someone/group with a bias goes looking for confirmation.

Look again. We've been asking the Arctic sea ice question since June of 2011, and had no reason initially to expect there would be strong political divisions on such a basic physical fact. If those political divisions vanished on the next survey, I'd be delighted.

As for the Trump/Hillary supporters thing in Figure 3, as I said that came about by coincidence -- WMUR/CNN commissioned the political question on a survey that also happened to carry my long-running ice question. I was curious to see what happens if you put those together, and the results were striking.

[bobcobb]

John,
You have a valid point about the icebreakers, but I still like Democrats for climate policy rather than Republicans lol

[G man]

[We've been asking the Arctic sea ice question since June of 2011] So beating a dead horse?
And on the other hand I could hit you with a study that show skeptics are more knowledgeable about science.

[jdallen_wa]

"And on the other hand I could hit you with a study that show skeptics are more knowledgeable about science."

Why tease us, G man. In fact, I'd like to see how they define "skeptic". Rather vague in your presentation of it.

[Fufufunknknk]

I am responding to the comment above: " several recent surveys testing whether conservative rejection of science on climate change and evolution has a mirror image in liberal rejection of science on GMOs, vaccines or nuclear power...."

Taking this comment at face value ( i.e. accepting that liberals do reject GMOs, vaccines and nuclear power - which I do not think is true, at least for sure liberals accept vaccines), the dividing line is not science versus not science. It is liberal humbleness before god, nature or whatever: liberals believe that all of these things can spin out of control. This is in agreement with the idea that we can damage nature beyond her ability to repair herself and that once it gets too bad we cannot do anything to stop it. Liberals are much more critical of technological programs than conservatives are *when it comes to believing the outcomes of poorly defined programs can be controlled outside of the laboratory.*

This is a huge difference. Personally, I think it is because liberals, on average, seek out more exploratory types of careers than conservatives and so tend to be attracted to more mentally demanding open fields. Conservatives tend to fields where they have more success, i.e. fields closed over human activities. As an example of a field that is closed over intended consequences and/or human activities. For example, a test pilot while requiring guts and talent has a limited range of effects. While unintended effects can destroy the plane, the effects stop there. Similarly, the affects of say working in business rarely have unintended consequences, the worst that happens is your business fails, or the economy gets screwed up. But, being a field limited to human endeavor, it will repair itself eventually even if individual humans are lost along the way. However, for anyone who works in a field with systems that do not have direct human controls or autamotically limited consequences is very humble about their ability to control those systems.

Liberals believe we cannot control gmos, nuclear power (although this is also doubtful), global warming, pollution, etc. Therefore their responses on these issues are conservative. It is not that liberals are hypocritical about science, they understand it much better than conservatives and so are cautious. Conservatives believe that liberal doubts are stupid.

[NeilT]

Late to the party as always.

I don't laugh at deniers, like jdallen and I have the same approach. Through patience and working with many people I have managed to change them from suspicion to absolute certainty that climate change is a human problem and that we need to do something sensible about it.

Each approach depends on the person who I'm talking to. Some people just need to be given the right and correct information and allowed to compare it with the information they have been reading. I've found this quite common for Daily Mail readers in the UK, who don't normally look outside the bubble. For others it may come down to laying out the information and then working with them to help them try and destroy the case for climate change from a hard core scientific position.

The second category often elicits the best response and also activists to help deal with climate change as they realise the scope of the problem and also how they were lied to.

The US political system is also one of the hardest to deal with. The more direct the democracy and the higher the levels of liberty in the society, the more likely people are to be coerced by self interest even to the detriment of themselves in the long run. US politics are polarised and entrenched to a remarkable degree. More important is that when most of the rest of the world look on, when the US says "Left" the rest of the world sees a progressive right wing movment. When the US says Right, the rest of the world sees people who think that Ghengis Khan was just a misunderstood reformer....

On the Antarctic front I have a few things to say.

If you want to include Antarctic, then you also have to deal with albedo and you have to include the ice mechanics of grounded ice and Glaciers, which means including Greenland.

Because Antarctic sea ice always reduces to near 0, as already stated, Albedo at the highest point in Antarctic sea ice is pretty much 0 and the impact of the sun on the water is pretty much the same.

So then we have to work out why the lower water is so warm and is undermining the landfast ice and the glaciers.

Glaciers in Antarctica and in Greenland are speeding up discharge. Yes, both Antarctica and Greenland are creating new ice, but the net balance is always negative ice, year on year, now.

As to the studies on Antarctic Ice? Then you have also to factor in this

http://www.livescience.com/45654-why-antarctica-is-rising.html

There is only _one_ ice mass measurement which is _not_ affected by the rising of the Antarctic continent. That is Grace. I do know that Grace has had calibration issues, but I have never heard that those issues extended to the difference between two measurements? Just the initial measurement.

In my experience the only people who want to talk about Antarctica, in the same breath as Arctic ice, are either people who know nothing about the whole cryosphere balance.... Or..... People who want you to believe what they are saying in the face of evidence which contradicts them....

Now I'll finish with one small thing. Recently, here, I stated that Obama was not wrong to give Shell the license to drill in the Arctic. That he needed to fight the battles which needed fighting.

In the long run, I was proved right. Obama, later, produced the strongest legislation, anywhere in the world, to try and curb US climate emissions.

Followed shortly after by Shell shutting down their Arctic drilling operations as non viable.

Thus Obama threw a non important (today), bone, to the GOP, immediately followed by strong and firm lead on emissions reduction with the other hand.

US politics. Obama seems to have a much stronger handle on it than the climate lobby and does his work despite their displeasure and lack of support.

It might be something to learn from????

[L. Hamilton]

[We've been asking the Arctic sea ice question since June of 2011] So beating a dead horse?

No, watching to see whether things change.

And on the other hand I could hit you with a study that show skeptics are more knowledgeable about science.

Is this the study you're thinking of?
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1871503

There also is this study, which found different results on the point that you mention, and includes a brief discussion of why their findings diverge.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/1088937X.2012.684155

[L. Hamilton]

Taking this comment at face value ( i.e. accepting that liberals do reject GMOs, vaccines and nuclear power - which I do not think is true, at least for sure liberals accept vaccines)

Ff, my remark was not a comment that should be taken at face value. It's a hypothesis that we tested and found false, as described in two un-paywalled papers. For a quick view it's worth just clicking on this graph
http://www.unh.edu/news/releases/2015/08/images/img-7TS2_Figure4.png

and that paper itself, reasonably public-friendly, is here,
http://scholars.unh.edu/carsey/252/

[BDS]

L H - yes, I read your abstract and the one about political facts. I am puzzled why you can't see the validity of my question.

If all the questions you asked were designed to highlight the ignorance of one subset of people (less informed individuals that sit on the "denial" side) your study is flawed. Said in another way - if the correct answers to the factual questions adhere to the general mindset of one side of the argument - less informed individuals would naturally assume a certain answer based on their beliefs. It is, in your words, a "gotcha" study.

I could easily craft multiple questions that weren't gotcha questions. Any questions like that in your study?

In fact your second abstract - the fact that you didn't find political divisions in less politicized factual questions - likely supports my hypothesis that all your questions were designed to expose the ignorance of one side.

I would still expect to find greater ignorance within the groups like your study suggested - however, I believe your study is biased and the findings exaggerate reality.

[L. Hamilton]

If all the questions you asked were designed to highlight the ignorance of one subset of people

They were not, that is your projection. As the "Polar facts" abstract notes,
"Analysis indicates that these facts subjectively fall into two categories: those that are or are not directly connected to beliefs about climate change."

Having made this observation the paper goes on to focus on facts in the second category, those that are *not* directly connected to beliefs about climate change.

Any questions like that in your study?

Yes, that's what the rest of the abstract is telling about.

[BDS]

Can I get an example of such a question? Just one. I'm looking for a factual question that is "politically charged", the answer of which would likely be at odds with the global warming enthusiasts mindset.

[L. Hamilton]

I'm looking for a factual question that is "politically charged", the answer of which would likely be at odds with the global warming enthusiasts mindset.

I know you are, you can't let that go, but as I keep saying, I'm not. Or the reverse.

[Andy Lee Robinson]

Consider this: if Antarctic sea ice is larger than normal in winter, it acts as an insulator to keep more heat in the ocean, which can then go on to nibble more calving fronts and increase land ice melt.

[BDS]

understand your point... probably side tracked a bit by "gotcha" and "tricky" and the posts which do point to the results of "politically charged questions"....such as CO2 levels and arctic ice. I still contend you would get different answers by political affiliation on Antarctic ice. I'm no tea partier - I just like dialogue that is as honest as it can be which is very hard to find.

[Fufufunknknk]

LH, Yes, you are right. I misread your post.

[L. Hamilton]

If anyone is curious to know more about the history and ideas behind these ongoing Arctic-perception surveys, there's a brief sketch in the ARCUS newsletter Witness the Arctic from spring of this year (free):

https://www.arcus.org/witness-the-arctic/2015/2/article/23160

What's next? While those surveys will continue and experiment with new questions next year, we have two non-survey Arctic projects involving different research teams this fall. One will update our 2014 retrospective analysis of the Sea Ice Outlook,

https://www.arcus.org/witness-the-arctic/2014/2/article/21066

This update will analyze data on more than 400 individual predictions over the course of 8 years.

The second project is looking at demographics and net migration from 43 Arctic Alaska towns and villages, including some that are said to be "on the front line of climate change" due to severe erosion problems. That project extends earlier work including a paper on "Visualizing population dynamics of Alaska's Arctic communities" (free):

http://scholars.unh.edu/soc_facpub/184/

[John Christensen]

D said:

"The basics of global warming were known long before it became a political issue. The denial of climate change by English speaking politicians is the direct result of the corruption of politics by fossil fuel interests."

D - you need to wake up, the fossil fuel interests are all over this already..

The CFR is known as a strong supporter of AGW. The Honorary Chairman of CFR is David Rockefeller - the Rockefellers who founded Standard Oil.

You also find at the executive level of CFR, people with background (or who have later joined) Goldman Sachs, Boeing, Unilever, Google, JP Morgan, in particular from investment banks that specialize in funding debt for the largest corporations and governments.

When these guys are in the game it is not because they are concerned about the global temperature - it is about money, lot's of money..

I am not trying to discount AGW here, but just saying that the largest energy and financial corporations are not closing their ears, they are pushing the agenda for their own gain.

[John Christensen]

The largest oil and finance corporations are very well represented at "Founder" and "President's Circle" corporate membership level of CFR:

Founders

Abraaj Group, The
Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Chevron Corporation
Citi
Exxon Mobil Corporation
Goldman Sachs Group, Inc.
Hess Corporation
JPMorgan Chase & Co
McKinsey & Company, Inc.
Morgan Stanley
Nasdaq OMX Group, The
PepsiCo, Inc.
Shell Oil Company

President's Circle

Alcoa, Inc.
American Express
Barclays
Bennett Jones LLP
BlackRock
Bloomberg
BP p.l.c.
Bridgewater Associates, LP
Coca-Cola Company, The
Credit Suisse
Dell Inc.
Deutsche Bank AG
Eni
Fluor Corporation
Fortress Investment Group LLC
Generali
Glenview Capital Management
GoldenTree Asset Management
Google, Inc.
Johnson Controls, Inc.
Kingdon Capital Management
Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
Lazard
Lockheed Martin Corporation
McGraw Hill Financial
MetLife
Moody's Corporation
Newmont Mining Corporation
Noble Energy Inc.
Parsons Corporation
Pearson
Pitney Bowes Inc.
Prudential Financial
Reliance Industries Limited
Soros Fund Management
Standard Chartered Bank
Thomson Reuters
Toyota Motor North America, Inc.
Veritas Capital Fund Management LLC
Zurich

The only larger US oil company not listed here is ConocoPhilips and that is because they have an 'Affiliate' membership level of CFR..

To me, the profile of the typical Republican voter is about a sentimental longing for 'the good old days' with guns, independence/little government or regulation, and no contraception..

The large oil and finance companies are interested in economic markets and therefore have a strong interest in the establishment of central institutions, regulations, and market places in the broader sense.

Check out how JP Morgan was caught in manipulating the California and Midwest energy market in 2013 and was fined $410 million:

https://www.ferc.gov/media/news-releases/2013/2013-3/07-30-13.asp#.Vi-_4ZiFPIU

This is why JP Morgan and Rockefeller supported the creation of the League of Nations, the CFR, UN, NATO, as well as of course the plans for cap and trade of CO2 and energy.

That said, these corporations provide strong support for both US political parties, so they can maintain influence whoever get to run the country.

Just check out the Nixon/Rockefeller relationship in the 60s if you are in doubt.