The Complexity Trap: Skepticism, Denialism and the Political Epistemology of Climate Science

Abstract

The complexity trap snaps and gives rise to misconceptions and even denialism when scientists leave their narrow field of expertise and uncritically use their well-trained epistemological concepts in areas where they do not apply. This mechanism is rather universal and affects in similar ways non-climate scientists in their assessment of climate science results, specialists in a climate science sub-discipline in interdisciplinary controversies, and climate scientists participating in the complex socioeconomic process of policymaking. Awareness of the complexity trap mechanism is the first step to avoid being caught in the trap.