How about that weather out there?
Nice and warm? Am I right?
I think if you look on the the
temperature gauge it's over 100
by far and it's going to be close
to 110 degrees this weekend,
so watch out for that.
Yeah, the hot spell as you know it's
lasted here a few weeks now and I'm
sure during that time someone in
your life has probably made a joke
or a comment about climate change
and the heat we're all experiencing.
Of course, now the scientific community,
they agree.
Evidence shows that human activity
is impacting the.
Planets climate overwhelmingly.
And anytime though you bring up climate
change or the human impacts on the planet,
there will be those that speak
up and say it's untrue science
and data they show otherwise,
but some people they say they just
don't buy the climate change facts well,
if you ever wondered why there are
skeptics of climate change and why do
the skeptics believe what they do?
Well, 2 research at the two researchers,
I should say at the University of Idaho,
they dove into the world of climate
change skepticism and they researched
why people are skeptical about.
Climate change and where those
beliefs come from.
They also set out to find if people are
firm in their opinions on climate change
or open to changing those opinions.
It's an interesting conversation.
We want to show you here on the 208.
Climate change and the human impact
of that can be a divisive topic,
although the scientific community agrees
overwhelmingly that human activity is
impacting dangerous climate change,
there will always be skeptics.
University of Idaho researchers,
they'll Shani Sassandra and Kristen
Haltiner interviewed climate change
skeptics across the northwest to
find out more about their beliefs.
The pair found three main reasons
for the skepticism on climate change.
The first conspiracy theories
people have this. Perception that.
Some international body is
seeking to acquire money and power
through climate change a second.
Grounding is in religion perspective that.
God created Earth for us to
use and therefore wouldn't.
Wouldn't make it possible for
us to ruin God's creation.
And or humans are arrogant to even
think we could influence God's creation
and then a third group of people
really had a distrust in science.
They perceived scientific research as bias
in bias towards believing in climate change,
having incentives.
That might sway scientists.
The duo approaches the topic
of discussing climate change
from different perspectives.
Dil Shani grew up in Sri Lanka
where she witnessed health issues
and poverty associated with
pollution and rising temperatures.
Climate change impacts are
putting significant burdens
on people in the global South,
especially small island nations.
So I had a personal interest in the topic.
Plus my research is driven by
the interest in public attitudes
towards controversial science
topics such as climate change.
Kristen took a wide view of the
world as she had her first child.
She worries about the planets
health for her son's generation.
I started to have a lot of climate anxiety,
and I was talking to two Del Shani about it.
And about sort of where I come
from and in terms of my research
and where she comes from in hers,
and we decided to put our anxiety climate
anxiety into action with this project.
The pair found that some people were
deeply committed to their skepticism
and position on climate change.
Others were not as firm
and open to discussion.
People who are skeptical about climate change
are not necessarily anti environmental.
We found that there's a lot of overlap
and concern about 3 specific areas.
One is pollution.
A direct direct quote from
someone we interviewed was no one
wants to breathe polluted air.
Habitat destruction and loss.
People are concerned about
losing animal species,
especially people who are hunters or hikers,
and then a third is actually
support for renewable energy.
We found that half the people
we surveyed supported expansion
of solar and wind energy.
The matter of perspective is a big take
away from the interviews and surveys
that the pair did with skeptics.
The point can also be echoed by the authors,
who have a book set to be published
on this topic next year in the
sense that this duo together they
come from different experiences.
But they have a shared perspective.
He grew up in such different environments.
She in the United States and me in Sri Lanka.
But we care about an issue that is really
affecting everyone at a global level.
So coming together from those
different perspectives and
working on a project together.
Really our bookcase like a
combination of years of work.
So we are very excited about that.
A major take away of the in-depth
research and reports is that some
climate skeptics are willing to
talk and change their opinion.
A key to that though.
Is finding common ground
a lot of the conversations about
climate change to be effective
can start from places of shared,
common, common, ground,
so perhaps you know being hunters or
being hikers or enjoying the outdoors
or being grandparents and worrying about
the futures of your grandchildren, right?
There's a there is a lot of common grounds
that we can begin these conversations
from to to sort of identify what we.
Care about in a mutual way
that can drive policy.
And that interview and segment is
just a small taste of the research
and a preview of the book that
they're working on for next year.
It'll be out next year and
we'll keep you posted on that.
But to learn more about their
work and really what they're
talking about and more of the
inside and the in depth analysis,
we're going to have a link to
that in this story at ktvb.com.
Highly recommend reading it.
I thought it was really fascinating
going through it earlier today.