Thanks for your response and particularly for the link.

I continue to have a problem with the way this is framed. It leaves out the real problem, which is the successful and vocal cadre of phony skeptics. As I follow this interesting group of exchanges between scientists and journalists about the failure of the public to grasp the complexities of climate change and the cliff edge they are hanging on, I keep noticing that they refuse to face the elephant in the room – the huge wealthy doubt and ignorance promoting machine that resents any restraint on the acquisition of wealth beyond dreams of avarice and appears to be entirely amoral if not immoral.

At this point in time, perhaps most important of all is to bring the pursuit of truth to the table. Scientists and journalists pointing the finger at each other is not helping, but what else can they do? The third party is not at the table, but waiting to pounce on anything and everything, with infotainment and virtual reality on their side.

Thanks for the comments.

On the Boykoff data cited in the “media reporting” bit in that graph, the data in that paper is from TV reporting from 1995-2004. I agree. TV news has serious problems in a variety of dimensions. But it’s not “media reporting” as a whole. As I’ve noted before in various threads of this conversation, Boykoff’s data on newspaper reporting more recently has concluded that the coverage reflects the consensus in about the same 97:3 ratio as the scientist numbers. You can find all his papers here:

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/about_us/meet_us/max_boykoff/

I know it seems unfair to lump you all in together, as some like Tom Yulsman actual report the science. But this is the problem in a nutshell. What to do? I tend to side with the Bunny in being frustrated, but with TY and his colleagues who feel they are being asked to carry the sins of their colleagues rather than get on with it.

rough quote from graphic:

Are scientists convinced?
97:3

Media reporting: does it reflect the consensus?
28% yes
72% no

Public perception: Are the public convinced?
26% yes
74% no

The close correspondence of the latter two sets of numbers shows an imbalance, don’t you think? I get that correlation is not causation, but something is wrong with this picture, and communication specialists are part of the problem, I think. The massive disingenuous comment campaign seems to be bearing fruit, dunnit?

It is not OK to ignore the elephant in the room – the influence peddlers and their massive disinformation campaign. People are being taught to ignore the evidence of their own senses in favor of this influence.
Are scientists convinced?

Eli rests his case.

a. Perhaps we will now get off the kick that all scientists need to be sent to communications re-education camp?

b. The fact that 1/3 to 1/2 the population believes in utter fables is a pretty good indication that something is not working. Moreover, the fact that fantasy rules in just about every area of human endeavor is a pretty good indication that the fault is not with the science part. What we have here folks is a failure to communicate and the communication of news is the business of journalists.

It’s clear that you’ve torched something here, but it’s not clear how your contributions to the resulting fire have been terribly useful if your goal is to convince journalists that their work needs to improve.

What you seem to be interpreting as denial on my part is me simply trying to get you to clarify the nature of the problem that seems so obvious to you, but that you’ve been unable to articulate to me. You think journalism sucks. I get that. But in what way?

In your original post, you said the problem was churnalism, and you gave some examples. I agree that churnalism is a problem, as do most journalists. So I look at the examples you cite, and it looks to me like churnalism’s not going on there. Check. Looks like we’re all on the same page here. But it also leaves me, as a journalist who actually made an attempt to take you seriously, thinking that you don’t know what you’re talking about. The people you need to reach with this message – journalists – are going to ignore you as a result.

Journalists talk seriously about these issues all the time, interacting with academics who study the communication problem, arguing with one another – the Society of Environmental Journalists (there are a bunch of academics and educators involved there), the National Association of Science Writers, Yulsman’s Transatlantic Media Network fellowships, the various Knight Foundation programs. These people, if they ever have occasion to drop by your blog and read your churnalism piece, are gonna say to themselves, as I did, “Wow, that guy doesn’t know WTF he’s talking about. Plus, he’s not only ignorant, but he’s being kind of a dick about it,” and move on to someplace where they can have a serious discussion.