The Increase of Global Temperature as a Result of the Greenhouse Effect: Assessing the Reasons for Disagreement Among Scientists

Abstract

This paper consists of two independent research projects which were carried out through the use of the same questionnaire. The questionnaire was completed by students of the Department of Forestry and Management of the Environment and Natural Resources, Democritus University of Thrace and by students of the School of Pedagogical and Technological Education in Athens. The two groups of respondents were asked to assess on a scale from 1 to 10 the reasons for disagreement among scientists regarding the increase of global temperature as a result of the greenhouse effect. The most important reasons are (1) the interdependence of science and economic activity (mean 7.33 for the students of Forestry and mean 7.22 for the students of the School of Pedagogical and Technological Education) and (2) the dependence of scientists on employers (mean 7.17 and 7.92). Reasons for disagreement are also the desire for personal fame (mean 6.88 and 5.92), the different scientific background and skills of every scientist (mean 6.68 and 5.88), the complexity of climate issues (mean 6.58 and 6.84), approaching the problem through emotion or logic (mean 6.57 and 6.19), the subjective element in each scientist which means seeing different things in the same picture (mean 6.65 and 6.00), the difficulty of proving hypotheses (mean 6.64 and 6.42), and access of scientists to different data (mean 5.55 and 5.40). Through the use of hierarchical analysis in clusters we have the following groups of variables: “financial dependence of scientists”, “possibilities regarding human and material potential”, “personality of scientists”, and “nature of the problem”. Generally, the scientific information regarding the increase of global temperature as a result of the greenhouse effect receives low grades by both the students of Forestry and the students of the School of Pedagogical and Technological Education (6.73 and 6.42). However, both groups believe that we should not wait for more convincing scientific information in order to adopt the necessary measures for confronting the problem (57.1% and 87.9%).