Click through to read the new report being criticized.
Most news content that isn’t simply the reporting of fact is an attempt to find – or manufacture – deeper meaning in events. This isn’t trivial work, of course, because there often is deeper meaning. But the inability to recognize coincidence or understand how patterns are established means that the habit of drawing conclusions from like events can look, well, stupid.
What struck me about this as interesting, though, is that MSNBC’s headline is perfectly accurate, and conveys precisely the right amount of fear and worry-making, about precisely the wrong thing. That is, nature is out of control. In a fundamental way, that’s the definition of climate change – nature gone wildly out of control, destabilized and with all that implies. We know this is happening because it is already happening – we can document that natural disasters related to climate change are happening more often. The mainstream media is trying to whip up fear about something that is actually occurring – but when it comes to climate change, the mainstream media mostly publishes “he said, she said” articles that lend wait to the denialists, implying that there was an equally credible case on both sides. We know that there is every reason to be afraid that more and more people will endure floods, droughts, wildfires, famines, heatwaves, storms…. – and we’re trying to find meaning in coincidence.
via Of Course Nature is Out of Control – Duh! : Casaubon’s Book.