Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Defeating the merchants of doubt

Nature volume 465, pages 686–687 (2010)Cite this article

Subjects

As climate scientists battle climate sceptics, they should note that we have been here before, say Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway. History holds lessons for how researchers can get their message across.

Ever since Charles Keeling began systematic measurements of carbon dioxide levels as part of the 1957–58 International Geophysical Year, scientists have been working to understand the effects of that atmospheric change on our climate. By the late 1970s, a consensus was forming about anthropogenic warming and, in 1992, the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change committed its signatories to preventing dangerous human interference in the climate system. Nearly two decades later, little progress has been made.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Relevant articles

Open Access articles citing this article.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Get just this article for as long as you need it

$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

References

  1. http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/fewer_in_us_believe_in_man_made_climate_change

  2. Nisbet, M. C. & Myers, T. Public Opin. Quart. 71, 444–470 (2007).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Leiserowitz, A. A. Global Warming in the American Mind: The Roles of Affect, Imagery, and Worldviews in Risk Perception, Policy Preferences and Behavior. PhD dissertation (2003); available at http://decisionresearch.org/pdf/540.pdf

    Google Scholar 

  4. Oreskes N. & Conway E. M. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming (Bloomsbury, 2010).

    Google Scholar 

  5. Michaels, D. Doubt is their Product: How Industry's Assault on Science Threatens Your Health (Oxford Univ., 2008).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Hansen, J. et al. Science 213, 957–966 (1981).

    Article  ADS  CAS  Google Scholar 

  7. Nisbet, M. C. & Mooney, C. Science 316, 56 (2007).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  8. Gleick, P. H. et al. Science 328, 689–690 (2010).

    Article  ADS  CAS  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  9. National Academy of Sciences Archive An Evaluation of the Evidence for CO2-induced Climate Change. Assembly of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Climate Research Board, Study Group on Carbon Dioxide (1979).

  10. Gwynne, P. Newsweek 64 (28 April 1975).

    Google Scholar 

  11. Paterson, T. C., Connelly, W. M. & Fleck, J. Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc. 1325–1337 (2008).

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Naomi Oreskes is a professor of history and science studies at the University of California San Diego, La Jolla, California 92093, USA. naoreskes@ucsd.edu ,

    Naomi Oreskes

  2. Erik M. Conway is a historian of science and technology affiliated with the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91109, USA. Their joint book Merchants of Doubt was published in May.,

    Erik M. Conway

Authors
  1. Naomi Oreskes
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Erik M. Conway
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Oreskes, N., Conway, E. Defeating the merchants of doubt. Nature 465, 686–687 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/465686a

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/465686a

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing