Will Conservatives Come Around On Climate Science?

by Patrick Appel

Dave Roberts, in one of his final posts before his internet hiatus, doubts it:

I just don’t think there’s any way to make the facts of climate change congenial to the contemporary U.S. conservative perspective. Once they accept the facts, the severity and urgency of the climate crisis, they are committed to either a) supporting vigorous government policy meant to diminish the power of some of their wealthiest constituents, or b) passively accepting widespread suffering.

Cognitively speaking, that’s an untenable position for them. That’s why they avoid it by rejecting the science. There’s no way to package the science in a way that avoids this dilemma. It is today’s hyper-conservatism, not climate communications, that is ultimately going to have to change.