Criticism
In a 2007 climate change survey published in the American Geophysical Union's international journal, Eos, Earth scientists were asked whether global temperatures had risen since 1800 and if so, whether this was due to human influence. Overall, 90 percent of respondents agreed that temperatures have risen. Regarding causes, though 82 percent indicated that human activity was a 'significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures," less than half of economic geologists agreed.
Given that economic geoscientists had the lowest percentage of all Earth scientists surveyed, critic and author John Cook has claimed that "climate scepticism seems strongest among geologists closely linked to the mining and fossil fuel industries" and that this is due to the influence of their funding. In suggesting a rationale for climate change denial, Cook noted a maxim by Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
The 2007 study's senior investigator, Dr. Peter Doran, has noted as it relates to the findings that 'the American Association of Petroleum Geologists has a public position statement formally rejecting the likelihood of human influence on recent climate.'
Read more about this topic: Economic Geology
Famous quotes containing the word criticism:
“When you overpay small people you frighten them. They know that their merits or activities entitle them to no such sums as they are receiving. As a result their boss soars out of economic into magic significance. He becomes a source of blessings rather than wages. Criticism is sacrilege, doubt is heresy.”
—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)
“The greater the decrease in the social significance of an art form, the sharper the distinction between criticism and enjoyment by the public. The conventional is uncritically enjoyed, and the truly new is criticized with aversion.”
—Walter Benjamin (1892–1940)