Abstract

The consensus that humans are causing recent global warming is shared by 90%–100% of publishing climate scientists according to six independent studies by co-authors of this paper. Those results are consistent with the 97% consensus reported by Cook et al (Environ. Res. Lett. 8 024024) based on 11 944 abstracts of research papers, of which 4014 took a position on the cause of recent global warming. A survey of authors of those papers (N = 2412 papers) also supported a 97% consensus. Tol (2016 Environ. Res. Lett. 11 048001) comes to a different conclusion using results from surveys of non-experts such as economic geologists and a self-selected group of those who reject the consensus. We demonstrate that this outcome is not unexpected because the level of consensus correlates with expertise in climate science. At one point, Tol also reduces the apparent consensus by assuming that abstracts that do not explicitly state the cause of global warming (‘no position’) represent non-endorsement, an approach that if applied elsewhere would reject consensus on well-established theories such as plate tectonics. We examine the available studies and conclude that the finding of 97% consensus in published climate research is robust and consistent with other surveys of climate scientists and peer-reviewed studies.

Details

Title
Consensus on consensus: a synthesis of consensus estimates on human-caused global warming
Author
Cook, John 1 ; Oreskes, Naomi 2 ; Doran, Peter T 3 ; Anderegg, William R L 4 ; Verheggen, Bart 5 ; Maibach, Ed W 6 ; Carlton, J Stuart 7   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Lewandowsky, Stephan 8   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Skuce, Andrew G 9 ; Green, Sarah A 10 ; Nuccitelli, Dana 11 ; Jacobs, Peter 6 ; Richardson, Mark 12 ; Winkler, Bärbel 11 ; Painting, Rob 11 ; Rice, Ken 13 

1  Global Change Institute, University of Queensland, Australia; School of Psychology, University of Western Australia, Australia; Skeptical Science, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia 
2  Department of the History of Science, Harvard University, USA 
3  Geology and Geophysics, Louisiana State University, USA 
4  Department of Biology, University of Utah, USA; Princeton Environmental Institute, Princeton University, USA 
5  Amsterdam University College, The Netherlands 
6  Department of Environmental Science and Policy, George Mason University, USA 
7  Texas Sea Grant College Program, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX USA 
8  University of Bristol, UK; School of Psychology, University of Western Australia, Australia 
9  Salt Spring Consulting Ltd, Salt Spring Island, BC, Canada; Skeptical Science, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia 
10  Department of Chemistry, Michigan Technological University, USA 
11  Skeptical Science, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia 
12  University of Reading, Reading, UK, now at Jet Propulsion Lab, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, USA 
13  Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK 
Publication year
2016
Publication date
Apr 2016
Publisher
IOP Publishing
e-ISSN
17489326
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/11/4/048002
ProQuest document ID
2549227488
Copyright
© 2016. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.