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The '97% of scientists agree' stat keeps shifting depending on who cites it
Last week I saw a post claiming 97% consensus on climate change, but the original 2013 study actually said 97.1% of published papers, not all scientists. Three years ago I dug into the methodology and found the real number drops to around 91% when you include non-climate experts. Why do we keep rounding up and flattening the nuance when the margin is already solid enough to stand on its own?
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murray.robert3d ago
The whole 97% thing gets mangled every time someone repeats it. That number came from papers, not people, and even then it only looked at climate experts. Rounding up to 97% makes it sound like a street poll instead of what it is, a strong but messy scientific agreement. The real point is that over 90% of published work still backs human caused warming, and that alone is enough. We do ourselves no favors by overselling a good result and giving skeptics an easy target. Just say the truth straight, it holds up fine.
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