“I expect a semi-dystopian future with substantial pain and suffering for the people of the Global South,” one expert said.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    19
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    6 months ago

    I can see some climate scientists just saying that 2.5C won’t be as dire as others predict without being stupid or paid off. There are often contrarians and sometimes (not often, but sometimes) they can be right, so it’s healthy to have them even when there is broad consensus. It’s how we came to accept ideas like plate tectonics.

    https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/when-continental-drift-was-considered-pseudoscience-90353214/

    So sure, maybe some of them are paid off (I doubt any of them are stupid since they have scientific degrees), but maybe some of them just disagree about the predictions for whatever semi-legitimate or maybe even legitimate reason and that’s fine. It’s worth exploring why just in case they could be right. The thing is, they’re scientists who are dissenting, not just some random guy on Facebook, which is why it’s worth exploring them.