Is the ocean broken?

I.N., It's interesting that, in the U.S. 14% think neither AGW nor the pandemic are a major threat; the highest by a significant margin of all the countries in this survey.

That indicates the lack of central control of the media. To me, that's very encouraging.

While it is important to a nation to be able to maintain a cohesive message of nationalism, what does it say, about the actual practice of free speech, that our government hasn't taken over the dissemination of information to its populous?

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

Will, if "lack of central control of the media" means the same to you as "freedom of the press" then you might be interested in the website Reporters Without Borders. They rank all the countries of the world according to how free their press is. Of the 14 countries listed in the article I posted, only Japan has a worse freedom of the press ranking than the US. Spain, France, Italy, S Korea and the UK are only slightly better than the US. (All of these countries are given a SATISFACTORY ranking) Denmark, Sweden and the Nederlands received the highest ranking (a GOOD ranking). See also Press Freedom Index | Wikipedia.

I'm not familiar with the QUALITY of news in other countries. In the US there is an organization which ranks the most well known news agencies in terms of liberal/conservative bias, and most reliable to least reliable news. Here is the most recent chart they have produced.



As you can see, some of the news sources that Our Dear Leader so frequently labels as "Fake News" are actually the among the least biased and most reliable. On the other hand the news organization that Our Dear Leader listens to the most, and who interviews him the most frequently, is biased between Skews Right and Hyper-Partisan Right, and is in the Somewhat Unreliable category. This particular news organization is also a favorite of many Americans. <roll eyes>

Given the above, it is not very surprising that there is such a high percentage of AGW deniers in the US.

 

The msm are marching in lockstep and suppressing the truth while vilifying all the wrong people.
Your chart is also showing the worst of them as the best so it is also untrue.

 

MASSIVE NEW CORAL REEF FOUND OFF THE COAST OF AUSTRALIA, FIRST IN 120 YEARS https://thedcpatriot.com/%E2%80%8Bmassive-new-coral-reef-found-off-the-coast-of-australia-first-in-120-years/

 

The media is the only way to get information about things like Climate Change to the populous. If the poles are accurate about how the people of each country feels about the threat of climate and infectious decease can be assumed to be correct, the countries with the lowest proportion of consensus would be the countries where the varied news agencies were not in agreement with each other. That would mean there was no central directing agency to control the messages being deceminated. Historically, governments that are the most controlling of the media are also the least trustworthy to give accurate, unbiased, and complete information.

I wouldn't suggest that this "freedom of the press" resulted in more accurate news or unbiased news. Clearly, the shift in news reporting style that began with the end of Walter Cronkite's career, as well as others who projected an aire of impartiality, to news reporting as popular entertainment designed to pull in viewers and make more advertising dollars, has biased the news towards their target audience.

It is unfortunate that it has gotten to the point where watching competing news organizations is no different than watching professional wrestling, but without the exciting body slams and sleeper holds.

I like NPR, not because I agree with their perspective, but because their reporting style is unadorned with emotionally elevated vocalization and blatent ad hominem. They maintain a sense of dignity that no one else I've heard since the 70s has.

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

NPR makes me puke.

 

Have you listened to 'Wait Wait Don't Tell Me' or 'Guy Noir'?

-Will (Dragonfly)

 

I'd sooner stick my finger down my throat.
It's bad enough I have to help pay for it.

 

New Fossils of Giant Bony-Toothed Birds Found in Antarctica | Paleontology | Sci-News.com http://www.sci-news.com/paleontology/pelagornithid-fossils-antarctica-08994.html

 

While NPR does not receive any direct federal funding, it does receive a small number of competitive grants from CPB and federal agencies like the Department of Education and the Department of Commerce. This funding amounts to approximately 2% of NPR's overall revenues.[24]

NPR - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NPR#Funding

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

What sticks in my craw is that I have to help pay for thousands of religious organizations because of their tax-exempt non-profit status.

 

Where do you think the DOE and DOC get their money?
Taxes.

 

Not the only way. Governments can do it directly as well. NOAA, NASA, etc, provide a lot of information on their web sites. But maybe you consider anything on the web to be part "the media," whether it comes from the government or private enterprise?

agree

Disagree. If two honest news organizations report on the same event, one would expect what they report to be very similar. However, if they write two different opinion pieces about the news event they could very well have totally different interpretations.

You may have noticed in the news bias chart that I posted showed that the two media organizations that are considered to be the most accurate and least biased are Reuters and AP. Neither of them "retail" news very much. Mostly they "wholesale" their news to other "retail" news organizations. As such, their most valuable asset is accurate, timely, and truthful news. They leave "spin" to the retail news outlets. As a result, if those two news collection agencies happen to cover the same news events there is very little difference between what they both report. Reality is reality... It's only when a news organization gives up their dedication to intellectual honesty that you start getting spin.

It's interesting to note which retail news outlets get the best marks for non-biased and most accurate. NY Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, NPR, Bloomberg, The Guardian, etc. They all produce content aimed for the most intelligent and best educated members of society. This type of audience have the highest standards of excellence and have the greatest ability to detect BS. And again, their reporting generally is very similar, even if their opinion pieces are different.

On the other hand, those news outlets rated as the most biased and least accurate are generally aimed at the least educated members of society. And it is from those news agencies where even the reporting of basic news events tends to have the most spin.

One reason why I think the science of climate change can be trusted is because the science is being done by scientists all over the world, and they aren't being controlled by any one government or funding organization. Yet there is a consistent message that AGW is real, serious, and urgent.

Agree. But the reverse is not necessarily correct. If a government does not control the media, that, by itself, is no guarantee that the information provided by the media is correct. Neither is it correct that no government can be relied upon to give correct information.

 

Government has no right to stifle dissenting views.

 

Declines in shellfish species on rocky seashores match climate-driven changes

• Five common species of mussels, barnacles and snails along the coast of Maine all have been experiencing declines
  
• Very young mussels were in the sharpest freefall, declining almost 16% a year
• Limpets, periwinkles and dogwhelks declined by 50% over twenty years
• The downward trajectory of mussels and common periwinkles matched up with increasing summer ocean temperatures collected from a nearby buoy.

The study was published in Nature Communications Biology.

 

For once, I agree with you.

Trump White House quietly cancels NASA research verifying greenhouse gas cuts

Science Under Attack | NY Times

Attacks on Science

The Trump Administration Has Attacked Science 100 Times ... and Counting

Science under attack | Nature