Untangling fake news from climate science
Discuss what is to be done about climate change, rather than argue about whether it's real.
THE Singapore government's recent decision to form a Select Committee to examine the problem of online falsehoods was an acknowledgement that when "fake news" spreads at Internet-speed via the likes of Facebook, YouTube and Twitter, the threat to public order cannot be viewed with complacency. Governments in the US, the UK, France, Germany and elsewhere are convulsed with protracted hearings about the role of Russian-supported news sites in the social media designed to sow political dissension and mistrust of public institutions in their countries.
Fake news, however, is not a new phenomenon. Media reporting of the climate change issue - among the most important international policy concerns for most governments in the past two decades or longer - has been plagued by charges of intentionally-biased and misleading reporting from both sides, advocates and sceptics.
On reading climate change news - both mainstream and that purveyed in the social media - the typical non-specialist news consumer is immediately faced with the stark choice between enlightened affirmation of "settled science" or "anti-science" denial. Climate change news is presented as a package deal: it is real, man-made and dangerous (as in President Barack Obama's famous tweet), or that it is not happening. But this is a false dichotomy.
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