The Risk of Climate Change Cliché

• Main Author: Vuong, Quan-Hoang
• Format: Other/Unknown Material
• Language: unknown
• Published: Center for Open Science 2018
• Subjects: Ocean acidification
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/haejk

Climate change is one of the most talked about issues on the planet, yet recently there has been a surge of skepticism towards its existence. After all, even EPA leader Scott Pruitt–who had recently resigned after certain ethics scandals–has claimed carbon dioxide emission not to be the main cause of climate change [1]. Rather than dismissing such assertions as stemming from corporate interest or just another conspiracy, we should ask ourselves why such arguments have made it into the mainstream at all. The reason might have a lot to do with the fact that climate change has become a buzzword. The general public is overexposed to not only the term but also the lineup of the consequences of climate change: global warming, ocean acidification, etc. The amount of discussion spent on climate change has saturated public attention and trivializes the matter, especially to people who didn’t truly feel concerned in the first place. As such, a large part of the public has come to believe that just discussing climate change–rather than doing anything about it–is enough.