Friday | February 2, 2007 | 5:34 PM
Media
Percentages of Certainty

O.K., so, from today’s Washington Post (“U.N. Climate Panel Says Warming Is Man-Made” by Juliet Eilperin):

There is no longer any reasonable doubt that human activities are warming the planet at a dangerous rate, according to a new worldwide assessment of climate science released today by the authoritative Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

With at least 90 percent certainty, the IPCC’s “Summary For Policymakers” concludes human-generated greenhouse gases account for most of the global rise in temperatures over the past half century. Hundreds of scientists from 113 countries prepared the report, which represents the most comprehensive overview of scientific climate research since 2001.

I wonder about that 90% figure, particularly here in the U.S. Why? Let me give you some other percentages of certainty:

  1. As recently as last February, 29% of Americans believed Saddam Hussein was personally involved in the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
  2. More than half of Americans say God created humans in their present form.
  3. More than 75 percent of Americans agree with health professionals that obesity is a serious problem. Yet two-thirds of Americans are overweight or obese, more than half don’t get the recommended amount of physical activity and 25 percent get almost no exercise at all.

In other words, despite strong evidence to the contrary, people will stick with their own ill-informed ideas and actions. Yee haw! Let’s keep up with those record carbon emissions and continue to scratch our heads over the disappearance of Arctic ice, rising sea levels and record heat waves. I’m pretty sure all those things are temporary anyway and have something to do with the sun orbiting a bit closer to the Earth than normal.

Sources

  1. The New York Times/CBS News poll, conducted Feb. 22-26, 2006, cited in “Few Americans Perceive Hussein-9/11 Link,” Mar. 1, 2006, Angus Reid Global Monitor
  2. “Poll: Creationism Trumps Evolution/Most Americans Do Not Believe Human Beings Evolved,” CBS/AP poll, Oct. 22, 2005
  3. Statistics from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, quoted in “Americans Missing the Boat on Fitness,” Nutrition Health Review, Fall 2004