Renowned climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe explains how we know that climate change is caused by humans. Then, learn about why there’s no such thing as “common sense.”
Renowned climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe explains how we know that climate change is caused by humans. Then, learn about why there’s no such thing as “common sense.”
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"Common sense" isn't a real thing by Kelsey Donk
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Find episode transcript here: https://curiosity-daily-4e53644e.simplecast.com/episodes/how-we-know-climate-change-is-caused-by-humans-w-katharine-hayhoe-and-the-myth-of-common-sense
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CODY: Hi! You’re about to get smarter in just a few minutes with Curiosity Daily from curiosity-dot-com. I’m Cody Gough.
ASHLEY: And I’m Ashley Hamer. Today, you’ll learn about how we know that climate change is caused by humans, from renowned climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe. Then, you’ll learn about why there’s no such thing as “common sense.”
CODY: Let’s satisfy some curiosity.
Climate change can be hard to wrap your head around. So it’s understandable why some people believe that climate change is not caused by humans. But that belief is also wrong. And that’s why we got in touch with a renowned climate scientist to explain how we know that the current climate crisis in, in fact, caused by humans. Katharine Hayhoe is a professor of political science at Texas Tech University, where she is director of the Climate Science Center. Her research has informed climate resilience and enriched climate policy at a federal and local level around the world. And in 2019 she was named a UN Champion of the Earth, which is the United Nations’ flagship environmental honor in the science and innovation category. In short: Katharine knows what she’s talking about. So we asked her a what we think is pretty much the most basic question you can ask about her field of study: how do we know that climate change is caused by humans?
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We hope this helped you understand how we know climate change is caused by humans. Feel free to share this episode with your friends for a short and sweet explanation if they’re ever curious. And tune in over the next couple Thursdays to hear Katharine Hayhoe discuss why she’s so passionate about the subject, as well as why we can be hopeful for the future.
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These days, we're being urged to "use common sense" when it comes to protecting ourselves from the coronavirus — but if you ask psychology researchers, there's no such thing. That’s right: common sense doesn’t really exist.
By definition, common sense is a basic level of sound judgment. But who decides what’s really sound judgment? Does your “common sense” match your neighbor’s? What about someone you’ve never met? Scientists have studied these questions, and they’ve found that no one person's "common sense" matches anyone else's because it’s too poorly defined.
For one study, researchers presented people with a plate of freshly baked cookies and asked them how many cookies they should eat, how many cookies would be a ‘moderate’ amount, and how many they’d have to eat to feel like they’d indulged.
Common sense would tell you that you should eat a moderate amount of cookies, so those two numbers should match. But that wasn’t the case. The majority of people said that a ‘moderate’ amount was more than what they ‘should’ eat. In a second experiment with gummy bears, the researchers found that the more people liked gummy bears, the more gummy bears they estimated to be a moderate amount. Common sense varied with a person’s sweet tooth.
And that’s the key. Common sense is actually just a judgment made through our biases and preferences — from how many sweets we want to eat right now to how much socializing we want to do during the lockdown. When it comes to the pandemic, it can extend to what services we think need to stay open and what we think society can do without. That’s an important lesson to remember when family, friends, and politicians in the age of COVID-19 say they’re just using ‘common sense.’
Science, however, is not about common sense. I mean, that’s why it’s so frustrating sometimes! The scientific method is specifically designed to put checks and balances on our individual biases. it's a system for looking past our assumptions and coming closer to the truth than we could otherwise. Common sense would tell you that the Earth isn’t moving. Science would tell you it is.
That’s why we should turn to scientists and public health experts to find out what we should do to keep ourselves and others safe during the pandemic. We can’t trust our guts to know what’s sensible in a strange time like this, but science can help us.
Let’s do a quick recap of what we learned today
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CODY: Today’s last story was written by Kelsey Donk, and edited by Ashley Hamer, who’s the managing editor for Curiosity Daily.
ASHLEY: Today’s episode was produced and edited by Cody Gough.
CODY: Join us again tomorrow to learn something new in just a few minutes.
ASHLEY: And until then, stay curious!