News and Interviews - Cranky Uncle

The climate lies you’ll hear this year

17 April 2024
Simon Clark, YouTube

Going behind the scenes at the best climate mythbusting site on the web

15 April 2024
Simon Clark, Nebula TV

Discussing Skeptical Science – one of the best resources on the web for countering climate misinformation – with key figures Dr John Cooke and John Mason

I Watched The Climate Deniers’ New Movie So You Don’t Have To

5 April 2024
The Climate Laundry

It need hardly be said that the “science” presented in Climate: The Movie, well, isn’t. As the Skeptical Science blog has shown, the film scores a near-full house on the anti-science, climate denial bingo card. All our favourites are here, including “the Medieval Warm Period was warmer” (it was regional); “it’s cold!” (so what?); “CO2 is plant food” (yes?); “satellites don’t show warming” (wrong); “CO2 is only a trace gas” (small volumes of things can have large effects); and “it’s the Sun” (just, no). (I urge you to read the Skeptical Science post for a detailed breakdown of the multiple falsehoods and fallacies presented.)

Climate change research: the do’s and don’ts

3 April 2024
Calgary Journal

“In order to solve climate change, we need enough political momentum,” says John Cook, a senior research fellow at Melbourne University and assistant professor at George Mason University. “If we are concerned but silent, that sends a signal that people don’t care and it has a spiralling, reinforcing effect.”

Never mind the science, News Corp has strengthened its climate denialism machine

2 April 2024
Christopher Warren, Crikey

This so-called “attribution” denialism accepts the effect while denying the cause. It’s long been part of the denialist toolkit (remember sun spots?), along with what Australia’s leading analyst of denialism, John Cook, calls denying the trend (“it’s just not happening”) and denying the impact (“it’s not making any difference anyway”).

Understanding the Misleading Techniques Used in Misinformation about Climate Change

1 April 2024
Canadian Association for the Club of Rome

Power Games and Superclaims: Understanding the Taxonomies of Climate Disinformation

21 March 2024
Mandy Henk, Tohatoha

The most detailed climate disinformation taxonomy is called CARDS, created by Coan et al. It’s a good taxonomy, but it suffers from some practical limitations, at least from the perspective of someone who works on countering disinformation. It is also intended to make the discourse machine-readable, a fact whose consequences we will come to shortly.

Critical Thinking Revealed: Dr. John Cook, Cognitive Psychologist on Climate Misinformation

13 March 2024
Dr. Linda Elder, The Foundation for Critical Thinking

What is the ‘new climate denial’ and how does it impact our response to climate change?

20 February 2024
Ankita Kulkarni, Logically Facts

“Experts suggest climate deniers have changed tactics because the results of global warming and climate change are evident to the public,” noted the CCDH report. Citing Michael Mann, a climatologist and geophysicist, and John Cook, a researcher on climate skepticism, the report further suggested that opponents of climate action were shifting towards misinformation targeting climate solutions to impede policy progress. Mann identified this shift as “inactivism,” involving tactics like deflection, delay, division, despair, and doomism.

ICRR Seminar Series: Best practices and case studies for debunking misinformation

20 February 2024
ICRR Seminar Series at the University of New South Wales

Countering climate misinformation

9 February 2024
Deepak Adhikari, The Himalayan

In 2013, John Cook, an Australian researcher and founder of Cranky Uncle, an online game against misinformation, developed a taxonomy called FLICC. The acronym stands for Fake Experts, Logical Fallacies, Impossible Expectations, Cherry Picking and Conspiracy Theories. We have already dealt with some of these terms. Fake experts often masquerade as genuine climate scientists, misleading people. Logical fallacy is when conclusions don’t logically follow from the premise. Impossible expectation is defined as a demand for certainty while science is an enquiry into an issue and uncertainty is part of the scientific method.

Michael Mann, a Leading Climate Scientist, Wins His Defamation Suit

8 February 2024
Delger Erdenesanaa, New York Times

The trial transported observers back to 2012, the heyday of the blogosphere and an era of rancorous polemics over the existence of global warming, what the psychology researcher and climate misinformation blogger John Cook called “a feral time.”

The Changing Focus of Climate Denial: From Science to Scientists

6 February 2024
Delger Erdenesanaa, New York Times

Within this category, scientists are even bigger targets than activists or politicians, said coauthor John Cook, a psychology researcher at the University of Melbourne. Attacks on scientists are “actually one of the most prevalent forms of climate misinformation,” he said.

Claims that “climate solutions don’t work” have also been gaining prominence and now make up more than half of the assertions coming from conservative research organizations, according to his group’s research.

No matter the form, all of these claims share the goal of delaying climate action, Dr. Cook said. “They try to get there through different pathways.”

New climate deniers are making millions on YouTube. But they’re lying.

3 February 2024
Chase DiBenedetto, Mashable

John Cook, a senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne’s Melbourne Centre for Behaviour Change, is one of the minds behind the original CARDS model, which was used in a robust 2021 study on climate misinformation trends from 1998 to 2020. CARDS takes researchers one step closer to what Cook calls a “holy grail” for fact checking, or something that can automatically and quickly detect false content.

Cause and Effect | The rise of climate denial: Social media’s role in climate misinformation

27 January 2024
Hindustan Times

BBC Focus on Africa podcast

24 January 2024
BBC

Coverage of Cranky Uncle Vaccine game in African countries begins in 23 minute mark.

Science vs. social media: Why climate change denial still thrives online

19 January 2024
Jessica Guynn, USA Today

John Cook, a senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne in Australia, says the rising wave of climate misinformation shows that companies are still not taking the threat of climate misinformation seriously enough.

“What the platforms are doing is inadequate,” Cook said.

On YouTube, climate denialism takes a turn

16 January 2024
Evan Bush, NBC News

John Cook, a senior research fellow at the Melbourne Centre for Behaviour Change at the University of Melbourne in Australia, developed the artificial intelligence model used by the Center for Countering Digital Hate.

Cook’s research has focused on trends in climate contrarian blogs and conservative think tank websites from 1998 to 2020.

The research, which was published in the peer-reviewed journal Scientific Reports, found a similar trend.

“It’s clear that the future of climate misinformation will be more and more focused on solutions and attacking climate science itself,” Cook said in an email. “Misinformation targeting solutions is designed to delay climate action, while misinformation attacking climate science erodes public trust in climate science and scientists.”

Climate Denial on YouTube Is Evolving. Here’s How to Make Sense of It

16 January 2024
Katie Collins, Cnet

Scientists have proven these narratives false, and the use of them as denial narratives is, thankfully, increasingly rare. In its report, the CCDH quotes climate skeptiscm researcher John Cook as saying this is because “science denial has become untenable” in light of people experiencing climate impacts for themselves.

How YouTube’s climate deniers turned into climate doomers

16 January 2024
Kate Yoder, Grist

John Cook, a researcher at the Melbourne Centre for Behaviour Change in Australia, has documented a similar rise in attacks on climate solutions by conservative think tanks and blogs. “It’s surprising to see misinformation on YouTube shifting so quickly,” Cook said in an email. “The future of climate misinformation will be focused on attacking climate solutions, and we need to better understand those arguments and how to counter them.”

Mobile-based game designed to fight misinformation around climate change, and now vaccines

16 January 2024
Melbourne Vaccine Education Centre

The ‘Cranky Uncle’ game – a mobile/web game designed to fight misinformation on climate change – has been adapted into the ‘Cranky Uncle Vaccine’ game for use in East African countries. Melbourne academic Dr John Cook developed the ‘Cranky Uncle’ game to incentivise players to build resilience against misinformation. The game relies on inoculation theory as a solution to misinformation. In the game, the cranky uncle character teaches the player techniques of science denial (e.g. fake experts and logical fallacies). The theory is that exposure to a weakened form of misinformation can develop cognitive immunity. The new ‘Cranky Uncle Vaccine’ game was co-designed through workshops held in Uganda, Kenya and Rwanda, and informed by a review of studies on vaccine misinformation.

We Fact Checked Everything Trump Has Said About Climate Change Since 2021

15 January 2024
Jeva Lange, Heatmap

“The most popular climate myths are the ones that are simple and easy to say,” as John Cook, a senior research fellow at Melbourne University’s School of Psychological Sciences who’s made a specialty of combatting climate disinformation, told me. “It’s the single-cause fallacy, thinking that only one thing can cause natural causes. But you can have other things like human activity that also drive climate change,” Cook added.

Start digging into this kind of logic and it quickly falls apart. For example, Trump’s argument is that the climate has changed naturally in the past; therefore, it must be changing naturally now, as well. But, Cook told me, the same logic could also be used to argue, People have died of cancer in the past; therefore, cigarettes don’t cause cancer now.

‘Cranky uncle’ game tackles vaccine hesitancy

10 January 2024
Juta Medical Brief

Australian academic and part-time cartoonist John Cook – who researches climate change misinformation and the best ways to combat it – is based at the University of Melbourne, and when he was building a game to teach people how to detect this misinformation, he drew a cranky uncle as the central character.

Since the Cranky Uncle game was launched in late 2020, it has been used by tens of thousands of people worldwide. Cook was then asked by Unicef if he could adapt his game to combat misinformation about vaccinations in the developing world.

Climate and vaccine misinformation seemed worlds apart – but it turned out the Cranky Uncle was a universal figure

7 January 2024
Graham Readfearn, The Guardian

Cook is an academic at the University of Melbourne who researches climate change misinformation and the best ways to combat it.

So when he was building a game that would teach people how to spot climate misinformation, the part-time cartoonist drew a cranky uncle as the central character.

Meme Makes Misleading Comparison to Cast Doubt on Climate Change

8 December 2023
Saranac Spencer, Factcheck.org

“Comparing media coverage of Greta Thunberg versus Judith Curry is like comparing apples to oranges,” John Cook, an expert in climate science communication, told us in an email. “Greta Thunberg is an environmentalist and typically media coverage about her focuses on the broader movement for climate action. Judith Curry is a scientist whose views are out of step with the mainstream climate science community.”

New mobile app to counter vaccine misinformation

30 November 2023
Daily News

‘Cranky Uncle Vaccine’ was developed as a collaborative effort by UNICEF, in partnership with the Sabin Vaccine Institute; Irimi, a public health behavioural design company; and the Senior Research Fellow Dr John Cook of the Melbourne Centre for Behaviour Change at the University of Melbourne.

Dr Cook developed the original ‘Cranky Uncle’ game using cartoons, humour and critical thinking to expose the misleading techniques of science denial to build public resilience against misinformation.

Climate lies ramp up ahead of COP28 talks in Dubai

29 November 2023
Stuart Braun, DW

“[Recent] COP meetings coincided with a surge in misinformation targeting climate solutions — specifically the argument that climate policy is economically harmful,” said John Cook, a cognitive scientist, senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne in Australia, and founder of the Skeptical Science blog that has long debunked climate misinformation.

How to Talk to Climate Deniers: a Short Guide

28 November 2023
Ellen Hodges, The Bubble

Climate denial arguments often follow the FLICC framework. This is:
Fake experts- creating the impression of ongoing scientific debate and appearing highly qualified, whilst often having no expertise in the relevant science.
Logical fallacies- distracting with irrelevant information and jumping to conclusions, or only presenting two choices when other are available.
Impossible expectations- requiring unrealistic standards of proof.
Cherry picking- using data out of context.
Conspiracy theories
These characteristics in climate denial arguments often come from unconscious psychological process- for example, people attribute expertise to those they agree with, and favour evidence that confirms their own belief. Instead of trying to address climate deniers’ motives, it is more beneficial to address their techniques.

Disinformation campaigns are undermining democracy. Here’s how we can fight back

21 November 2023
Stephan Lewandowsky, John Cook, The Conversation

Misinformation is debated everywhere and has justifiably sparked concerns. It can polarise the public, reduce health-protective behaviours such as mask wearing and vaccination, and erode trust in science. Much of misinformation is spread not by accident but as part of organised political campaigns, in which case we refer to it as disinformation.

But there is a more fundamental, subversive damage arising from misinformation and disinformation that is discussed less often.

It undermines democracy itself. In a recent paper published in Current Opinion in Psychology, we highlight two important aspects of democracy that disinformation works to erode.

The Misinformation Machine

16 Nov 2023
Amber Whittle, The Peel Podcast

Trying to combat climate misinformation and science denial at the Thanksgiving table? We talk with John Cook, senior research fellow at Melbourne Center for Behavior Change on how to tackle those difficult conversations.

John Cook’s battle against climate deniers: “It all started with my father-in-law”

14 Nov 2023
La Repubblica

For more than ten years he has been studying and fighting misinformation, especially that concerning climate change and today he believes that “the only tool we can really use is critical thinking”. This is what John Cook will talk about in Italy, invited by the Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change (CMCC) to three public events: on 15 November in Rome at the WWF headquarters at 4 pm , the title of the meeting is Climate, news and fake news ; the afternoon of the 16th in Florence in the Fortezza da Basso during the Earth Technology Expo ; on the 18th at the National Geographic Fest 2023 at Citylife Anteo in Milan.

How big a threat does misinformation pose to democracy?

6 Nov 2023
Joshua Benton, Nieman Lab

Which brings me to a new paper from a set of heavy hitters in the misinformation academic research space. It’s titled “Misinformation and the Epistemic Integrity of Democracy,” and it’s by Stephan Lewandowsky, Ullrich K. H. Ecker, John Cook, Sander van der Linden, Jon Roozenbeek, and Naomi Oreskes — variously of Harvard, Cambridge, and the universities of Bristol, Potsdam, Melbourne, and Western Australia. (It’s a pre-print set to run in Current Opinion in Psychology.) It gets at a growing problem in epistemic battles — rhetorical attacks on those who attempt to referee them.

With This App, Students Can Learn To Spot Argumentative Errors – Even At The Christmas Dinner Table

4 Nov 2023
India Education Diary

Zsuzsika Sjoerds was just teaching the course Psychology and Science together with Sebo Uithol when a student approached her after a lecture on argumentation errors and asked: ‘But what if I hear a family member make such an error later at the table: how do I react to that?’

Sjoerds: ‘That’s a very applied way of looking at it. I immediately thought of an app I knew, Cranky Uncle. In it, a cranky uncle makes statements on topics like the environment and politics that make no sense at all due to fallacies. You have to correct that uncle all the time, until at some point he learns what good reasoning is.’

Empower Your Climate Awareness with these Top 5 Books from the British Council Digital Library

18 Oct 2023
British Council Digital Library, Telegraph India

In the context of climate change, the author, Dr. John Cook, humorously points out the prevalence of misinformation, conspiracy theories, and the obstinate denial of the issue. Dr. Cook, a cognitive psychologist and the founder of Sceptical Science, uses humour and science to provide clear and rational arguments in the climate change debate. The book equips readers with tools to engage in informed conversations about climate science.

Fact, Myth, Fallacy: Unraveling Misinformation in Climate Science and Beyond

16 Oct 2023
Sarah Palmer, Charity Today

However, sometimes when misinformation has reached critical mass, we need to tackle it head on with rebuttals. The ‘Fact, Myth, Fallacy’ model was developed by academic John Cook to rebut misinformation in ways that are as ‘sticky’ as the original lie.

With climate misinformation on the rise, here’s how to spot it

25 Sep 2023
David Boraks, Blue Ridge Public Radio

This fits a familiar pattern of climate disinformation, said John Cook, a senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne, Australia. He is a cognitive psychologist whose work focuses on how disinformation spreads and how we can spot it and stop it.

“Over time, the climate change issue has become more polarized. And misinformation has played a big part in that,” Cook said.

‘Climate villain’: scientists say Rupert Murdoch wielded his media empire to sow confusion and doubt

23 Sep 2023
Graham Readfearn, The Guardian

Dr John Cook, who researches climate science misinformation at the University of Melbourne, said under Rupert Murdoch’s leadership News Corp had been “a major source of climate misinformation”.

“The damage they’ve caused is real and has been quantified by scientists – watching Fox News reduces people’s acceptance of the reality of climate change compared to watching other outlets.”

“Ironically, News Corp internally sought to take a leadership role on climate change by reducing their carbon footprint, while their media outlets have denied climate change and attacked the science. The hypocrisy is reminiscent of fossil fuel companies who internally recognised the reality of climate change while publicly casting doubt on the science.”

Systematic character assassination of climate researchers

23 August 2023
David Zauner

Misinterpreting and exaggerating scientific uncertainties, questioning the scientific consensus on climate change or threatening individual scientists with sanctions – these are just some of the strategies of this scene. Two years ago , a research group showed that character assassination of climate researchers and decision-makers was the most common misinformation strategy used by deniers.

Subsequently, the US communication scientist Sergei Samoilenko and the Australian cognitive researcher John Cook have now taken a closer look at so-called ad hominem arguments in a recently published study . The study was published in the journal Climate Policy .

An insidious form of climate denial is festering in the Republican Party

11 August 2023
Rebecca Leber, Vox

More Americans are impacted by climate change; 62 percent of all voters recognize climate change is caused by human activity, according to a Gallup poll from this spring. Yet, climate change denial is not only alive and well in the GOP, it’s become “a lot more insidious and polarizing,” said John Cook, a University of Melbourne researcher who has tracked the path of climate disinformation online using artificial intelligence.

Why is climate denial still thriving online?

11 July 2023
Stuart Braun, DW

These are old rhetorical tricks that today are targeted less at climate science than solutions, says John Cook, a climatologist and senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne, and author of the Skeptical Science blog that has long debunked climate misinformation. The idea that “solutions will be harmful” or “solutions won’t work” is a repackaging of old attacks on the cost of climate action from the 1990s, he added.

How video games & quizzes are boosting vaccine education

25 May 2023
Gary Finnegan, Vaccines Today

The Cranky Uncle game has been developed by scientists at University of Melbourne in Australia to teach critical thinking and build resilience against misinformation. It trains users to recognise and respond to science denial, highlighting the most common approaches of those who spread false information: Fake experts, Logical fallacies, Impossible expectations, Cherry picking, and Conspiracy theories (FLICC). The game has been adapted to address vaccine misinformation and, in partnership with UNICEF, the Sabin Vaccine Institute, and Irimi, is being used in East Africa, Pakistan and Ghana. (Vaccines Today will publish an article on this later in the year.)

Dr. John Cook discusses using inoculation to combat science denial and vaccine misinformation

26 May 2023
Serena Balani, The PropWatch Project

How video games & quizzes are boosting vaccine education

25 May 2023
Gary Finnegan, 2023

The Cranky Uncle game has been developed by scientists at University of Melbourne in Australia to teach critical thinking and build resilience against misinformation. It trains users to recognise and respond to science denial, highlighting the most common approaches of those who spread false information: Fake experts, Logical fallacies, Impossible expectations, Cherry picking, and Conspiracy theories (FLICC). The game has been adapted to address vaccine misinformation and, in partnership with UNICEF, the Sabin Vaccine Institute, and Irimi, is being used in East Africa, Pakistan and Ghana. (Vaccines Today will publish an article on this later in the year.)

Countering Science Misinformation – A case study of the Great Barrier Reef

19 May 2023
Political and Environmental Psychology and Social Science 2023 seminar series, University of Queensland

Technology Red Flags: What Accessible Tests Can You Apply To Cleantech Innovations?

4 May 2023
Michael Barnard, Clean Technica

The red flags are broken into three categories: technology, business model, and marketing, and this article lays out the technology ones, with the rest to follow. The intent is that anyone who can Google well can apply this filter. Like John Cook’s Cranky Uncle vs Climate Change, which provides very accessible cognitive inoculation against bad logic and disinformation, I offer it to assist readers to avoid falling into cleantech silver bullet traps.

Turning the Tide: Combatting Misinformation in Public Health

28 Apr 2023
Columbia University

Farewell Tucker Carlson, climate change denier whose claims never stacked up

26 Apr 2023
Graham Readfearn, The Guardian

Dr John Cook, an expert on climate science denial at the Melbourne Centre for Behaviour Change at the University of Melbourne, said: “One of the most common techniques in climate misinformation is trying to erode public trust in climate science through personal attacks and straw man arguments.

“The hypocrisy is that inconsistencies and failed predictions from climate deniers – of which there are many – are studiously ignored.”

The real reason Tucker Carlson should have been fired

26 Apr 2023
Louise Boyle, Independent

“Tucker Carlson and other hosts at Fox News have been prolific and influential spreaders of climate misinformation,” Dr John Cook, a senior research fellow at the University of Melbourne and an expert on misinformation, told The Independent via email.

“The problem is there’s no climate version of Dominion to hold them to account for misleading the public about climate change.

“Instead it’s the public and the environment that will pay the price for delayed climate action due to misinformation, in the years and decades to come.”

The danger of the Flat Earth theory

14 Apr 2023
Matthew Ross, Logically Facts

Dr. John Cook of the Melbourne School of Psychological Sciences, an expert in science denial, told Logically Facts, “fact-checking Flat Earthers is difficult because once a person goes down the rabbit hole of conspiratorial thinking, they are distrustful of any evidence that contradicts their conspiracy theory.” Relying on traditional scientific methods, arguments, and experts will be dismissed by Flat Earthers, who will instead cite their own “research,” no matter how inaccurate or fantastical.

Climate misinformation group infiltrates convention of science teachers

14 Apr 2023
Louise Boyle, The Independent

Dr John Cook, a professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University and founder of the Skeptical Science website, previously told The Independent that a defining characteristic of climate misinformation was the “attacks on scientists, and on the science itself”.

“The misinformation arguments are that people can’t trust scientists, can’t trust models, can’t trust climate data. It’s all about building doubt and undermining public trust in climate science,” he said.

Meet the cranky uncle ‘vaccinating’ people against conspiracies

13 Apr 2023
Angus Dalton, Sydney Morning Herald

“This debunks the notion that communicating facts to climate deniers will change their minds,” Dr John Cook, a University of Melbourne researcher who developed a game called Cranky Uncle that teaches people to fight misinformation, tweeted in response to the fracas.

Twitter has always been a hotspot for climate change misinformation. On Musk’s watch, it’s heating up.

10 Jan 2023
Jessica Guynn, USA Today

Preliminary data gathered by the research project CARDS, or Computer Assisted Recognition of Denial and Skepticism, which uses machine learning to detect and categorize claims skeptical of climate science, shows that Twitter attacks on climate scientists are escalating, according to John Cook, research fellow at Monash University.

‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuels

22 Dec 2022
Social Europe

John Cook, an academic specialising in climate misinformation, has found that explaining misinformation or the tactics used can be a powerful tool for inoculation against it. Perhaps a different path might have been taken by the commission if the IGU strategy documents had been available to it at the time.

AI at the intersection of species conservation and climate action

15 Dec 2022
AI for Good Webinar

Climate foes push Great Reset conspiracy theory

6 Dec 2022
Scott Waldman, E&E News

Before long it was turned into a rallying cry against Covid-19 lockdowns and, then, as a warning against climate action. Conservative activists used it to claim that environmental laws and regulations were an attack on their personal freedoms, said John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia and an expert on climate disinformation.

“Combining the claim ‘climate policy limits freedom’ with ‘climate change is a conspiracy’ is a potent combination as it combines conservative ideology with the conspiratorial mindset of a science denier,” he said. “So the climate lockdown conspiracy theory has the potential to resonate with climate deniers and spread further.”

Twitter’s climate vigilantes

11 Nov 2022
Emily Atkin, Heated

Sometime in the last two weeks, however, the option to report tweets for containing any type of misinformation disappeared. That’s particularly bad timing, given that global climate negotiations are taking place this week in Egypt, said John Cook, a climate change communications professor at Monash University.

“History tells us that every COP climate summit coincides with a surge in climate misinformation, as climate delayers try to confuse the public about the need for urgent climate action,” he said. “Given that misinformation spreads faster than facts on social media platforms, now is a terrible time for Twitter to start rolling back features to report misinformation tweets.

“On the contrary,” he added, “social media platforms need to be more proactive in countering misinformation which have a damaging effect on society and democracies.”

Geologist misleads with climate change ‘proof’ claim

1 November 2022
Lachlan Coady, AAP Factcheck

Dr John Cook, a researcher at the Centre for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University in the US, agreed.

“Empirical science doesn’t ‘prove’ anything – it collects lines of evidence and as more independent evidence builds up, our scientific confidence increases,” he told AAP FactCheck in an email.

“When it comes to human-caused climate change, there are multiple lines of evidence that human activity is driving current climate change.”

Climate Talks – Episode 04: Breaking the Climate Science

31 October 2022
Sophia Li, Meta

The science around the climate crisis is no longer disputable. So now the question is, what is the role each of us can play in talking about the climate with our friends, and help bring more people into this movement? How can we debunk the myths and uplift the facts? How do we balance urgency with optimism? In this episode, we’ll speak to researcher John Cook and activist Jon Leland to unpack how we can better communicate about the climate—with skeptics and believers alike.

Long-Awaited Climate Newsletter Launches With Chevron Sponsorship

27 October 2022
Molly Taft, Yahoo

The type of messaging in the ad is an instantly recognizable form of greenwashing for those of us who spend time tracking Big Oil. The phrase “low-carbon future” is intentionally misleading and an example of what some experts call “paltering”—an “attempt to distract from their polluting behavior,” John Cook, a climate change communication researcher at Monash University, told us last year. Sure, some “solutions” companies like Chevron are working on may emit less CO2 than traditional fossil fuels do. But many energy analyses have found that any new oil and gas exploration is incompatible with the goals of the Paris Agreement; the world must stop creating new fossil fuel projects immediately if we want to have any hope of keeping warming below catastrophic levels. As long as companies like Chevron continue to expand their fossil fuel production, it’s false to say that they’re working toward any sort of brighter future for the climate.

Teaching About Climate Change Denial in the Media

24 October 2022
James S. Damico and Mark C. Baildon, Teachers College Press

Techniques or tactics for promulgating climate denial are well-documented—for example, see John Cook’s work with the FLICC Model; William F. Lamb and colleagues, who delineate discourses of climate delay; and the work of Geoffrey Supran and Naomi Oreskes, who describe frames used in climate change communication.

From climate change denial to delayism: Oil firms send academics into the fray

10 October 2022
Heriberto Araújo, El País

“A prolific source of climate misinformation has been conservative think tanks and organizations focused on market deregulation. They have received many millions from fossil fuel companies,” John Cook, one of the leading experts in analyzing and combating climate propaganda, explains by email. These entities served the oil bosses, says Cook, to “broadly attack climate science, whether it was the scientific consensus, climate models or climate data, or the scientists themselves.”

“It is about stopping misinformation from Cranky Uncles”

9 September 2022
Sabrina Schröder, Wissenschafts Kommunikation

How to Beat Fake News? ‘Vaccination’ Could Be the Answer

27 August 2022
Elizabeth Svoboda, The Wire

Elsewhere, researchers and organisations are experimenting with inoculation efforts on a smaller scale. In Australia, communications professor John Cook designed an online course in 2015 to teach people how to detect common disinformation tactics used by climate deniers. So far, more than 40,000 people have enrolled in Cook’s course.

Anti-Science Conspiracy Theories, Power, and Morality

27 August 2022
Paul Braterman, Primate’s Progress

Why Are Oil-and-Gas Companies Developing Lesson Plans for Teachers?

26 August 2022
Ainslie Cruickshank, The Walrus

Researchers have found that misinformation about climate change is shifting from outright denial of the science to more subtle efforts to delay cutting greenhouse gas emissions, says John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub in Australia. Concentrating on individual actions is another subtle form of misinformation—it can delay broader climate action. Such a narrow focus is a “red herring,” says Cook, who argues it serves to distract people from the system-level changes needed to transition whole economies and societies off fossil fuels. “It’s a very insidious and it’s a very effective argument,” he says.

Cook’s research looks at misinformation-inoculation techniques at schools, essentially “teaching critical thinking to students,” he says. There are two parts to these methods: warning people about the risks of subtle tactics and giving them tools to recognize those tactics. Cook and a creative agency developed a critical-thinking game called Cranky Uncle as a way of teaching about misinformation with humour. So far, he estimates the game is being used by 400 to 500 teachers, including about twenty in Canada. A “cranky uncle” steers players through the various strategies, including fake experts or impossible expectations, employed by those who want to mislead others and then offers players a chance to test their knowledge through quizzes. The idea is to teach students “to spot misleading rhetorical techniques and logical fallacies,” Cook explains. “One thing that education can do really effectively is not just teach the facts but also teach how the facts can be distorted.

‘Pre-bunking’ shows promise in fight against misinformation

24 August 2022
Associated Press, Spectrum News 1

That transferability makes pre-bunking a particularly effective way of confronting misinformation, according to John Cook, a research professor at Australia’s Monash University who has created online games that teach ways to spot misinformation.

“We’ve done enough research to know this can be effective,” Cook said. “What we need now is the resources to deploy this at scale.”

US to spend more than USD 500 bln on climate over next decade

22 August 2022
TVP World

The notion of consensus of climate change being a man made phenomenon has been significantly enhanced by the proliferation, by the likes of former US president Barack Obama and former British PM David Cameron, of a paper by John Cook et al, which concluded that 97.1 pct of climate scientists agree with the aforementioned assertion.

The paper, entitled ‘Quantifying the consensus on anthropogenic global warming in the scientific literature’ examined the abstracts of around 12,000 journal articles published between 1991 and 2011. All articles cited humans as contributing to, not the main cause of, global warming were considered a part of the 97.1 pct consensus.

Beware of fake climate experts

19 August 2022
Glenn Branch, The Gazette

Faced with a solid scientific consensus, whether on climate change, evolution, or the shape of the earth, science deniers such as the folks at Heartland have a limited repertoire of responses, helpfully described in a catalog compiled by John Cook, a researcher now at Monash University in Australia. In the present case, Boettger is invoking what Cook calls fake debate: “presenting science and pseudoscience in an adversarial format to give the false impression of an ongoing scientific debate.”

Climate Denial: The man behind ‘Sceptical Science’, John Cook, helps us better understand climate denial

12 August 2022
Robert McLean, Climate Conversations

John Cook created ‘Sceptical Science‘ and through the story “Shocked By Climate Change Denial? How To Deal With Misinformation” gives us a better grasp of what climate denial is and what form it takes.

Those who say the climate crisis is a lie

10 August 2022
Kenji Hayakawa, Quartz

Don’t be fooled by fossil fuel industry’s ‘green’ word salads

31 July 2022
Stella Levantesi, Independent Australia

Associating climate change with religion reinforces the denier message that the build-up of greenhouse gases and their far-reaching global impacts is actually a matter of faith and has nothing to do with a factual, physical reality in the form of heatwaves and hurricanes.

In this scenario, climate advocates seem unreasonable, disconnected from reality and unable to see things clearly. The effect is to relegate those supporting climate science to one end of the spectrum — one where we don’t need to address the intensifying impacts of heating the globe.

But this zealous religious framing happens beyond the pages of Il Foglio. According to Cook, deniers also use words like “cult” and “high priests” to describe climate advocates, while emphasising that they, themselves, are “treated like heretics”.

Of climate deniers, Cook said:

“They are framing themselves as the rational scientific person and the scientists or advocates as the hysterical, biased, faith-based and not evidence-based. They’re trying to flip reality because ideology is driving their denial.”

Addressing Climate Change Disinformation to Help Build Consensus for Solutions

28 July 2022
Angrej Singh, Tech Policy Press

Climate change is one of the most polarized issues in the United States, a Pew Research report found. Stances on the subject have become an almost purely partisan issue, according to John Cook, a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University. “When you have politicians saying climate change is not happening, that sends an influential social signal that ‘our tribe’ shouldn’t believe this thing,” Cook added.

How to Think About Your Carbon Footprint

26 July 2022
Bloomberg

“We’re hypocrites if we just live high-emission lifestyles while talking about needing to stop carbon-dioxide emissions,” says John Cook, a research fellow at Monash University’s Climate Change Communication Research Hub. “That reduces our effectiveness as messengers because we aren’t consistent.”

Embrace students’ eco-anxiety to spur critical and systemic climate action

8 July 2022
Times Higher Education

Denying reality to cope with the truth of it, while perhaps understandable, is not beneficial. Rather, we must teach our students how climate change denial is real and help them to identify it. There are even some ways to make this fun. I like to use the Cranky Uncle app, which was created by Monash University scientist John Cook and uses cartoons and critical thinking to fight misinformation, with my students and have them compete with each other on it.

Fact Check-NASA did not announce that climate change is only driven by variations to Earth’s orbital position relative to the sun

8 July 2022
Reuters Fact Check

The Milankovitch Cycles are changes in the Earth’s orbit and tilt that occur over long time periods, John Cook, research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University, told Reuters.

“They change the way sunlight hits the Earth at different times of the year, which over long time periods gradually influence the Earth’s climate,” Prof Cook said, pulling the Earth in and out of ice ages, with ice sheets growing and retreating (here).

Fighting Misinformation Online 2022: Ideas exchange

28 June 2022
Google News Initiative

After a win for U.S. climate change education, classroom implementation is off to a slow start

24 June 2022
Menachem Wecker, Youth Today

He drew in particular on the writings of climate change communication researcher John Cook, who founded the site Skeptical Science. Two decades later, Amidon now devotes between two and four weeks to climate change in a typical term.

Climate Denial, Misinformation, and Confirmation Bias with Dr. John Cook

17 June 2022
Keerthi Selvam, 1.5 Celsius podcast

We all have that one relative that vehemently denies the possibility of global warming, and logic just doesn’t seem to change their mind. Today, we’re talking to climate psychologist Dr. John Cook, who discusses common arguments used by climate skeptics and how to respond to them. We also learn about common sources of misinformation, as well as what makes these tactics so effective.

Being human means we have biases. Rapid decarbonization requires us to confront them

17 June 2022
Michael Barnard, Illuminem

Their confirmation bias — Kahneman writes of this in Thinking, Fast and Slow of course, and I’ve spoken to cognitive scientists like John Cook, famous for Skeptical Science and Cranky Uncle vs Climate Change about it — prevents their acceptance of data which contradicts their preconceptions, and means that they vastly over rely on weak data that supports their preconceptions.

White lies: Daily Telegraph’s excitement over bumper snow season skates over facts

16 June 2022
Graham Readfearn, The Guardian

Dr John Cook, at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub, was a co-author of a study last year that used special software to track climate contrarian arguments from 33 blogs and 20 thinktanks.

He told Temperature Check there was “a transition away from science denial arguments” but, he said, “the cold weather argument is a keeper.”

“It’s a persistent argument and it’s not going away,” he said, and the argument’s stickiness was down to its simplicity.

He said: “The simple myths like ‘cold weather disproves global warming’ are easier to understand than talking about the second law of thermodynamics.”

Climate Deniers and the Language of Climate Obstruction

16 June 2022
Stella Levantesi, DeSmog

According to John Cook, founder of Skeptical Science and research fellow at Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub in Australia, fossil fuel industry propaganda has been intensifying the “othering” of climate scientists and advocates for climate action for some time.

“There’s a lot of terminology that has become more powerful in sending that signal that climate advocates are different,” said Cook. “Labels to say, ‘these people who care about climate change are trying to change society.’” Climate denial is intimately connected to values like individual freedom and free market fundamentalism, he explained. That’s why those labels are often extended in meaning to accuse climate advocates of a “radical liberal agenda,” said Arena.

Do better: an urgent message to Australian media on climate coverage

19 May 2022
Croakey Health Media

Dr John Cook, from the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub, told Croakey that this kind of framing of climate change is “really buying into and reinforcing climate misinformation framing, whether it’s from the fossil fuel industry or from right wing think tanks”.

How to Spot—and Help Stop—Climate Misinformation

26 April 2022
NRDC

“The biggest shift has been the gradual transition from science denial to solutions denial,” says John Cook, a cognitive scientist at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub in Melbourne, Australia, whose research focuses on preventing climate misinformation. This version of denial still seeks to undermine and potentially delay climate action, but its false arguments are more subtle. They peddle lies that say climate policies are harmful for the economy or that you can’t trust climate scientists.

Climate misinformation: How do we tackle it?

16 April 2022
DW Living Planet

In this special episode, three experts on climate disinformation discuss how factually inaccurate and misleading information travels around the web. Climate journalist Stella Levantesi, communication researcher John Cook and Wikimedia strategist Alex Stinson join Living Planet host Sam Baker for an engaging round-table discussion, which originally was broadcast as a live discussion.

Breaking down climate misinformation with Amy Westervelt and John Cook

15 April 2022
Climate One

John Cook is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia. He says the most common climate misinformation in the U.S. centers on climate policy being harmful, expensive or ineffective:

“Ultimately, its goal is to delay climate action and maintain the status quo. And you will find that no matter what the argument is, the conclusion is always the same: whether they’re arguing climate change isn’t real, therefore we shouldn’t act. Or climate change isn’t caused by humans, therefore, we shouldn’t act. Or solutions won’t work, therefore we shouldn’t act.”

Meet the recipients of the Climate Misinformation Grant Program

4 April 2022
Poynter

“Misinformation about climate change is a global, interconnected problem, and solutions need to be equally large and interconnected,” said John Cook, selection committee member and Monash University research fellow. “Adding capacity to fact-checking communities around the world to skillfully and promptly respond to climate misinformation is a crucial part of the puzzle. In particular, we need stronger links between fact-checkers and experts in climate science and solutions, across different languages and regions. This grant program lays the foundation for important future work in fighting back against misinformation that confuses the public about climate change and delays desperately needed climate action.”

Why teach critical thinking about climate change?

2 March 2022
National Center for Science Education

Teaching climate science is crucially important as climate change is one of the most important issues facing humanity today. But we also need to teach our students how to think and assess arguments, particularly in a modern world where we are all bombarded with misinformation. Misconception-based learning can help teachers achieve this, building both science literacy and critical thinking skills in their students.

Building Resilience Against Misinformation Through a Cartoon Game

9 February 2022
AAAS

John Cook, a climate communication researcher and finalist for the 2022 AAAS Early Career Award for Public Engagement with Science, describes how a chance meeting with game developers led to their collaboration on a misinformation game.

‘He can do what he likes’: Inside Spotify’s love affair with Joe Rogan’s misinformation

30 January 2022
Io Dodds, The Independent

John Cook, who studies climate change denial narratives at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub in Melbourne, Australia, told The Independent that they were “very old, debunked arguments that I’ve seen a million times over the last decade and a half”.

Dr Cook added: “He talks as if he’s saying something insightful, but it’s a complete misunderstanding of how science works.”

Big Oil’s New Ad Campaign Is ‘One of the Creepiest’ It’s Ever Made

28 January 2022
Brian Kahn, Gizmodo

“Typically the approach of fossil fuel companies is to focus on a specific benefit of fossil fuels, while ignoring the negative impacts,” John Cook, a climate communication expert at Monash University, said in an email. “What is especially insidious about this type of advertising is the implicit message that fossil fuels are essential to maintain our current lifestyle. This is a false narrative. There are alternatives that can provide the same benefits without harming the environment.”

The dilemmas of debunking climate disinformation – conversation with John Cook

27 January 2022
The Mallen Baker Discussion

Climate change denial on Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and TikTok is ‘as bad as ever’

21 January 2022
Jessica Guynn, USA Today

John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University who advises Facebook, says the proliferation of climate misinformation on social media reflects the torrent of misinformation coming from a combination of science denial and skepticism about climate policy and renewable fuels and technologies.

“One element of climate misinformation that seems to be particularly prominent on social media is culture war type posts that attempt to paint people concerned about climate change as belonging to some separate social group intent on impinging on people’s freedoms,” Cook said. “This is a particularly damaging form of misinformation as it exacerbates public polarization on climate change, making progress more difficult.”

Election misinformation helped fuel the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. Now, climate misinformation threatens the planet.

7 January 2022
Maxine Joselow, Washington Post

John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia, pointed to research showing that misinformation about climate solutions is on the rise and that climate misinformation can cancel out accurate information.

“I think there’s a misconception that climate misinformation is not as dangerous as covid or election misinformation,” he said. “But it’s an existential threat.”

Results of 1st cohort project Critical Climate Machine – currently at Digiloglounge – Who Can We Trust?

6 January 2022
Gaëtan Robillard, Media Futures

“Online, low quality information is just as or more likely to go viral as high quality information”, says cognitive scientist John Cook. Recent research in the field of cognitive science establishes new methods in technocognition, where artificial intelligence is used to assist misinformation detection. Critical Climate Machineis largely informed by this approach. It develops machine learning strategies to investigate deceptive discourse about climate change.

Creative Messaging on Climate Change

1 January 2022
theDIHEDRAL

Conversations concerning climate change can be overwhelming, depressing, and confrontational. Despite the difficulties, it is a conversation that needs to be on-going and relentless. Join us as Dr. Marion Hourdequin from Colorado College, Dr. John Cook from Monash University, Dr. Beth Osnes from the University of Colorado Boulder, and Ting Lester, member of Young Womxn’s Voices for Climate, discuss Creative Messaging on Climate Change.

How to convince a science denier to reconsider their beliefs

18 December 2021
CBC Radio

This script was discovered by Mark and Chris Hoofnagle, and it was developed further by John Cook and Stephen Lewandowsky, who are cognitive scientists and it goes like this: there are five tropes of science denial reasoning.

Every science denier cherry picks data, believes in conspiracy theories, engages in illogical reasoning, relies on fake experts and denigrates real experts, and here’s my favourite: that science has to be perfect in order to be credible.

Google Pledged to Remove Ads From Climate Denial Sites, but Many Still Run

16 December 2021
Hiroko Tabuchi, New York Times

“There’s no ambiguity that these pages are out of sync with mainstream climate science,” said John Cook, an assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University, whose research encompasses using machine learning to identify climate misinformation. “They shouldn’t be difficult to blacklist.”

And even though much of the rest of the world has moved on from more blatant forms of climate denialism, the United States has remained particularly vulnerable, Dr. Cook said. “There are parts of the country where science denial is still flourishing, and those tend to be the markets for these types of web pages,” he said. “Climate misinformation confuses and polarizes the public, delays climate action and reduces trust in scientists.”

Climate conversations: How to talk with friends who repeat misinformation

10 December 2021
Christian Elliott, Medill Reports Chicago

Talking about the problem can help combat misinformation. “Friends and family are the most trusted sources of information about climate change,” said John Cook, a researcher at the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication. “When people see their friends and family pushing back against misinformation that can be effective in stopping the misinformation from spreading.”

How to talk to vaccine-hesitant people

10 December 2021
David Robson, BBC

It is very easy to be duped by messages that are crafted in this way. Cook’s research, however, suggests that explaining these kinds of deceptive techniques can help to reduce a person’s belief in misinformation, particularly if they are yet to form a strong opinion on a subject. The method is sometimes termed “inoculation” or “pre-bunking”, since the knowledge helps protect people from falling for similar kinds of fake news in the future too.

New artificial intelligence tool detects most common climate falsehoods

10 December 2021
Kasha Patel, Washington Post

After nearly five years of development and tweaking, John Cook and his colleagues debuted their project: a machine-learning algorithm that can detect climate misinformation on the Web.

The algorithm sounds like science fiction: It “reads” sites and flags those with claims presenting false or misleading information about climate change science and solutions.

But something ironic happened around two weeks after the software was made public in Nature Scientific Reports. The algorithm detected a blog post about its own methods, attempting to discredit them.

“It’s quite funny. It was kind of a bit of a meta moment,” said Cook, a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia.

Climate Change Chat for Realists with Dr. John Cook

10 December 2021
Steve Dondley, Climate Change Chat for Realists

Alone against climate change?

9 December 2021
Deutchlandfunk Kultur podcast (German)

Climate change: How machine learning holds a key to combating misinformation

8 December 2021
John Cook, Monash Lens

When it comes to misinformation about climate change, you often hear the terms “whack-a-mole” or “climate zombies” – typically expressed through clenched teeth. These refer to the fact that climate myths never seem to die, persistently rearing up to be debunked over and over. Indeed, the misleading arguments found in climate misinformation in the early 1990s are the same myths we now hear in 2021.

While this can be annoying, climate zombies present a research opportunity. The fact that climate misinformation shows so much stability makes it possible to train a machine to detect misinformation claims.

Pushing back on lead ammo and fishing tackle misinformation

7 December 2021
Sam Totoni, Environmental Health News

Inoculation can even be effective for addressing polarizing issues. John Cook is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub. In one of his studies, participants learned about the tobacco industry’s use of fake experts to cast doubt on the science about health impacts of smoking. This was effective in inoculating against the same approach used in climate denial.

“Because climate change is so polarizing, but tobacco is not as polarizing, I was able to inoculate people,” Cook said.

Why some of your favorite podcasts are filled with oil company ads

5 December 2021
Amy Westervelt, The Guardian

It’s unsurprising that Exxon’s ad passed media companies’ filters, said John Cook, research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University, Australia, and an adviser to Facebook on climate disinformation. That’s because it deploys a tactic often used by oil companies called “paltering”, he said, the use of truthful statements to convey a misleading impression.

“It requires background knowledge to spot it, so it’s tough,” Cook said. “They can run an ad that’s 100% accurate statements. Exxon is investing in algae – that’s 100% true – then they can do a lot to convey the impression that they’re environmentally friendly without conveying that they’re spending more on advertising than on algae tech. So it’s very hard for factcheckers or social media guidelines to catch that because the companies can say ‘What? Everything is true.’”

4 new myths about climate change—and how to debunk them

4 December 2021
Sara Kiley Watson, Popular Science

Still, there are plenty of op-eds boldly stating that renewable energy policy will hurt the vulnerable—often to make the case for expanding fossil fuels. But these arguments are simplistic and overlook the bigger, more important picture, says John Cook, a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia.

“More broadly, these types of arguments ignore the harmful impacts of climate change that damage society and the economy—the costs of climate inaction will be far greater than the costs of climate action,” Cook says.

Digital Teaching and Learning: Special Session w/Dr John Cook

1 December 2021
Emma Pauncefort, 3CL Foundation

As part of the DTL: The Pre Edit Community of Practice Initiative, a Special Session has been produced with Dr John Cook – author of Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change (2020) & creator of the app Cranky Uncle.

Breaking the Climate Silence

29 November 2021
Sophia Li, Climate Talks podcast

The science around the climate crisis is no longer disputable. So now the question is, what is the role each of us can play in talking about the climate with our friends, and help bring more people into this movement? How can we debunk the myths and uplift the facts? How do we balance urgency with optimism? In this episode, we’ll speak to researcher John Cook and activist Jon Leland to unpack how we can better communicate about the climate—with skeptics and believers alike.

Debunking past messaging may allow us to predict future climate change denialism

26 November 2021
RMIT ABC Fact Check

In an email, John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow with the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub and one of the study’s authors, explained: “The argument goes that global warming stopped in 2016, by plotting temperature trends from the record hot year in 2016. It’s exactly the same misleading technique as ‘global warming stopped in 1998’ that was used prior to 2016.”

He added that the past helped to predict future messaging.

“Our data shows that when you apply a certain stimuli (for example, introduction of climate legislation), you see spikes in certain types of misinformation (eg, arguing climate policy is harmful),” Dr Cook said.

Hear ye, hear ye! Climate Misinformation and the Future of Business

26 November 2021
Izzy Ahrbeck, Purpose Talks podcast

In our LAST episode of the season, we talk to 3 change-makers about climate misinformation and what it means for business leaders.

Stop Funding Heat, a climate campaign group, said 202 was the worst year yet for climate misinformation spreading on Facebook with a 70.6% rise in engagement on posts containing false information about the environment. They also claimed that only 3.6% of content flagged as climate misinformation is fact-checked. In this episode, we tackle how consumers and businesses are affected by this and how we need to recognize climate misinformation as one of the biggest barriers to halting the climate emergency.

We spoke to an academic, a journalist and an advertising professional who explained the history of climate misinformation, what it is, how it spreads, how advertising and journalism play a role and how leaders can positively engage with it.

Gigantes do petróleo usam desinformação como arma no debate climático (Petroleum giants use misinformation as a weapon not climate debate)

21 November 2021
Glauco Faria, Rede Brasil Atual

An investigation confirms that the attacks on “climate solutions” are more growing at present, or that involve arguments such as that renewable energy cannot replace fossil fuels or that energy transition will cause ruin to the economy, unemployment and inflation.

Thanksgiving advice, 2021: How to deal with climate change-denying Uncle Pete

21 November 2021
Richard Somerville, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists

Our climate system is like an irritable beast, that over-reacts to even small prods. Right now, we’re hitting it with a big stick in the form of excessively high carbon emissions from human activity—which our cranky uncle refuses to accept is happening (and ulimately causes the bear to be poked even more). Image courtesy of John Cook, from his Bulletin article “Making sense of your climate-denier”

5 Big Lies About Climate Change, And How Researchers Trained A Machine To Spot Them

19 November 2021
David Vetter, Forbes

“One of the most valuable insights from our research was identifying the most prevalent categories of climate misinformation—attacks on the integrity of climate science, and misinformation targeting climate solutions,” said John Cook, a study author and postdoctoral research fellow with the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University. “This shows the value of using a model to provide an objective, quantitative analysis. My gut instinct was that science myths were much more prevalent than they actually are, when our analysis found they were a relatively small proportion of climate misinformation.”

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheeple? A.I. Maps 20 Years of Climate Conspiracies

19 November 2021
Phil Newell, Daily Kos

During COP26, Facebook served ads with climate falsehoods, skepticism

19 November 2021
Elizabeth Culliford, Reuters

Two external researchers working with Facebook on its climate change efforts told Reuters they would like to see the company approach climate misinformation with the same proactiveness it has for COVID-19, which Facebook cracked down on during the pandemic.

“It does need to be addressed with the same level of urgency,” said John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University who is advising Facebook on its climate misinformation work. “It is arguably more dangerous.”

Climate change deniers are over attacking the science. Now they attack the solutions.

18 November 2021
Kate Yoder, Grist

“It kind of dismayed me, because I spent my career debunking the first three categories — ‘it’s not real, it’s not us, it’s not bad’ — and those were the lowest categories of misinformation,” said John Cook, a co-author of the study and a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia. “Instead, what they were doing was trying to undermine trust in climate science and attack the actual climate movement. And there’s not much research into how to counter that or understand it.”

Finding climate misinformation

16 November 2021
Deborah Devis

Monash University research fellow Dr John Cook and colleagues from the University of Exeter, UK, and Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, trained a machine-learning model to automatically detect and categorise climate misinformation.

“Our study found claims used by such think-tanks and blogs focus on attacking the integrity of climate science and scientists, and, increasingly, challenged climate policy and renewable energy,” Cook says.

Climate Deniers Are Using These Four Major Scare Tactics to Stop Climate Action

16 November 2021
Stella Levantesi & Giulio Corsi, Desmog

According to John Cook, research fellow at Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub in Australia, climate misinformation used to be more focused on undermining the science, but over time, the strategies have been moving more towards attacking solutions and creating fear, as well as leaning towards “cultural-war” type misinformation.

“It’s about scaring people and ‘othering’ people who care about climate change or who are concerned about climate change and advocating for action,” said Cook.

12 November 2021
Greg Bensinger, New York Times

“The results from the American presidential election show that the social media companies have the capacity to address misinformation on a broad scale,” said John Cook, a postdoctoral research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University who is advising Facebook on its climate misinformation efforts. “But they’ve not put the resources or effort behind this that are necessary.”

The next front in Facebook’s misinformation battle: climate change

7 November 2021
Clare Duffy, CNN

“Given that [climate change] is an existential threat, we can’t be casual about the seriousness about the threat of climate misinformation,” said John Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University. “It needs to be addressed with the same level of urgency and proactiveness that they’re showing with Covid-19 and election misinformation.”

Will Protestors At School Boards Come For Climate Science Next?

5 November 2021
Marshall Shepherd, Forbes

John Cook wrote in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, “The problem with ‘teach the controversy’ when it comes to human-caused global warming….is that there is no controversy—not a scientific one, at least. Teaching that scientists have major disagreements where they do not is simply to spread misinformation.”

John Cook on Changing Behavior, Changing Minds

4 November 2021
Peter Sinclair, Climate Denial Crock of the Week

Welcome to anti-Cop26: The climate-change denial expo in Vegas where attendees talk anything but science

3 November 2021
Sheila Flynn, Independent

Dr John Cook, professor at the Centre for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University and founder of the Skeptical Science website, told The Independent last year that Heartland was “one of the particularly prolific producers of climate science misinformation, whereas a lot of others tend to focus on policy”.

Not Just “97 Percent” – Even for Petro Scientists, Climate Denial is Now “Untenable”

1 November 2021
Peter Sinclair, Climate Denial Crock of the Week

Warming Trends: The BBC Introduces ‘Life at 50 Degrees,’ Helping African Farmers Resist Drought and Driftwood Provides Clues to Climate’s Past

30 October 2021
Katelyn Weisbrod, Inside Climate News

The biggest jump in consensus was among economic geologists, a discipline that includes scientists that help industry groups find natural resources like fossil fuels. Only 44 percent of these scientists agreed in 2009 that global warming was caused by human activity. That number has since risen to 84.1 percent.

“Amongst this group who have a vested interest in not thinking that burning fossil fuels will cause climate change, they nearly doubled the level of agreement that fossil fuels are causing climate change,” said John Cook, a climate communication researcher at Monash University in Melbourne.

29 October 2021
Matt Wille, Input

The way these Big Oil companies are spreading misinformation is particularly sneaky because the statements they make aren’t outright lies. When ExxonMobil tells the public it’s “advancing climate solutions like carbon capture and storage to help create a lower-carbon future,” the statement itself is technically true. Exxon is, indeed, researching these solutions.

This technique is often called “paltering.” The investigation cites John Cook, a climate change communication researcher, defining paltering as a method commonly used in greenwashing, where companies attempt to distract from their polluting behavior. Like yeah, sure, Exxon is doing this research, but the company’s entire business model centers on emitting CO2 into the atmosphere.

Misleading climate ads from Big Oil explode ahead of Big Oil climate hearing

28 October 2021
Emily Atkin, HEATED

The statements use a misinformation technique called “paltering,” said John Cook, a climate change communication researcher at Monash University. The term refers to the practice of saying things that are, on their own, literally true—but create a misleading overall impression.

“Paltering is commonly used in greenwashing, a form of climate misinformation where companies attempt to distract from their polluting behavior,” Cook said. “A company boasting about capturing CO2 when their core business is emitting CO2 into the atmosphere through burning fossil fuels is a textbook example of greenwashing.”

Brain Research Must Be On The COP 26 Agenda

27 October 2021
Becca Roberts, Fior Reports

The lens of brain research gives us a more complete picture of our roadmap out of the climate crisis. We can invest more in neuroscientific research to understand these issues and to study, diagnose, and treat these environmental mental health problems. For example, the game “Cranky Uncle” can be used to improve brain function and teach individuals logical fallacy and critical thinking in the context of climate change. In the game, players must identify the form of science denial that corresponds to the possible arguments of climate change. Deniers, such as “How can models predict the climate 100 years from now if they don’t get the forecast next week?” And “Climate models are imperfect, so they cannot be trusted.” Addressing climate change, which can help develop solutions to depolarize climate beliefs and encourage action to mitigate climate change. Overcoming cognitive biases and improving brain function will be keys to preventing climate change, which in turn will contribute to it will result in significant damage to the brain prevent health.

Consensus Revisited: Do Scientists Still Believe in Anthropogenic (Human-Caused) Climate Change?

20 October 2021
SciTechDaily

“Although there have been many studies finding a consensus amongst climate scientists, there’s little research into exactly how agreement has evolved over time and how different definitions of climate expertise shape that view,” explains John Cook. “This is the first time the methodology of the 2009 study has been replicated to measure how climate consensus has strengthened over time.”

Prof. Hayhoe on Dr. Cook’s dad

19 October 2021
Katharine Hayhoe

Australia’s biggest excuse for doing nothing on climate change busted

14 October 2021
Benedict Brook, News.com.au

Dr Cook is a researcher at Monash University’s Climate Change Communication Research Hub specialising in climate misinformation, and he has heard just about every excuse out there for why Australia should not tackle the changing climate.

“You have to fight sticky myths with even stickier facts,” he told news.com.au.

‘Big Tech has spoken: It’s time to end the debate about climate change.’

8 October 2021
Melissa Koenig, Daily Mail

John Cook, a George Mason expert in climate communication, also said research shows that simply telling people they are wrong is not enough, ‘You also have to explain why or how it is wrong,’ he said of the idea of the Climate Science Information Center.

‘That is important from a psychological point of view.’

Fighting back against climate misinformation and the damage being done

27 September 2021
John Cook, Monash Lens

Misinformation about climate change has polluted our information landscape for three decades, poisoning public discourse and clouding minds. We tend to think that the main danger of misinformation is causing people to believe wrong things. But there are a multitude of ways that it does damage.

Facebook Will Fund Fact-Checkers Fighting ‘Climate Misinformation’

18 September 2021
Ailan Evans, Daily Caller

“Misinformation about climate change is a huge, interconnected problem, and solutions need to be equally large and interconnected,” said John Cook, a research fellow at Monash University and selection committee member.

Who Should We Listen to about the Global Warming Crisis?

2 September 2021
David Johnson, The Great Courses Daily

According to University of Queensland Fellow John Cook, 97 percent of climate scientists agree that anthropogenic climate change is happening. Of the nearly 4,000 published studies that took a position on the topic, 3896 of them drew that conclusion, which certainly counts as a consensus.

Of course, that’s just one study. Maybe Cook was biased. Indeed, editorial writers at Forbes and National Review argued just that. But they’re not scientists and thus aren’t qualified to evaluate his work. The blind reviewers who decided to publish Cook’s article are. What’s more, Cook’s 97 percent number has been corroborated by six other studies. So there’s even a consensus about what the consensus is.

How to talk to conservatives about climate change

1 September 2021
AJ Dellinger, Mic

… he also made connections with climate scientists and experts who helped show him the way. That might not be available for everyone (that said: Reach out! You might be surprised who is willing to take the time to answer your questions), but the website Skeptical Science is. Inglis points to this site — the work of climate scientist John Cook — as an essential tool for explaining and understanding the science of climate change. “You can get a quick answer or you can go deeper if you want,” Inglis says. “It’s a great source.”

Tesla Power Play: Why running a contested Elon Musk narrative is playing with fire

29 August 2021
Simon Alvarez, Teslarati

Dr. John Cook, founder of Skeptical Science and a specialist on false news, noted in a statement to Teslarati that stories such as the two CEOs’ supposed conversation could easily become an inspiration for conspiracy theories, or at least confirm people’s preconceptions of individuals in power. The Skeptical Science founder noted that when people encounter new information that confirms their own preconceptions, there is simply a high likelihood that they would believe it, even if the anecdote’s turthfulness is contested.

“When you have powerful people involved in misinformation, that’s ground for conspiracy theories. So having people like Elon Musk and Tim Cook — inevitably, people get suspicious of people in positions of power, and that’s a very human and natural bias called intentionality bias. We tend to ascribe motives and intent behind what can even be random events. And that’s especially the case when you have powerful people,” Dr. Cook said.

Climate Deniers and the Phantom Arsonists They Can’t Get Enough Of

18 August 2021
Molly Taft, Gizmodo

John Cook, a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University and the founder of the Skeptical Science blog, agreed with Lewandowsky when I asked him the same question. “I think [deniers] like any explanation of the cause that’s not human-caused climate change,” he said. Cook pointed out that one of the GOP’s most contentious new members of Congress, Marjorie Taylor Greene, has floated the conspiracy theory that space lasers operated by Democrats were responsible for starting the Camp Fire. It’s even more unhinged than the claims of arson, yet is still an explanation accepted as plausible in some QAnon circles. “Regardless of the phenomenon, they’ll always grasp at any alternative explanation,” Cook said.

What to do about misinformation (in four dimensions)

13 August 2021
Bay Area Skeptics

30 July 2021
Taylor Telford, Washington Post

“Fossil fuel companies rarely if at all misinform the public directly these days. They’re too savvy for that,” said John Cook, one of the researchers on the study and a research assistant professor at George Mason. “Following in the footsteps of the tobacco industry they started using external groups to launder their misinformation … which mainly gets amplified through social media and mainstream media.”

Climate misinformation is “remarkably static,” Cook said: The central arguments made by oil and gas industries are the same now as they were in the 1990s. But the cost is substantial, Cook and other researchers found: It messes with public understanding of climate change, polarizes the public, reinforces climate silence and lowers support for climate action.

How to engage with someone who supports the anti-lockdown protests

28 July 2021
Belinda Jepsen, Mamamia

“People are more vulnerable to conspiracy theories when they feel anxious, when they feel threatened, and when they feel out of control. And that’s exactly the kind of conditions you get during a pandemic,” Dr John Cook, cognitive scientist at George Mason University and the co-author of The Conspiracy Theory Handbook, previously told Mamamia.

The Grim Reaper & The Republican Party Embracing Climate Action Are The Only Things That Will Eliminate US Climate Change Deniers

28 July 2021
Michael Barnard, Clean Technica

In my discussions last year (part 1, part 2) with John Cook, PhD, cognitive scientist, founder of Skeptical Science, and author of Cranky Uncle vs Climate Change and The Debunking Handbook, he admitted that his entire PhD thesis was based on the assumption that it was possible to convince climate change deniers with logic and reason, and that subsequently, especially since his career took him to the USA, he realized that tribalism was a vastly more powerful force than he had understood in shaping tribal member’s world views.

Scalable Interdisciplinarity: Lamont Summer Stars Lecture

21 July 2021

Games for Change conference: Disinformation Games

15 July 2021
Panel organised by Global Engagement Center, U.S. State Department

Tilting at Strawmen and Other Tricks of Climate Denial Enablers

9 July 2021
Mark Boslough, talk to Bay Area Skeptics

A guide to prebunking: a promising way to inoculate against misinformation

29 June 2021
Laura Garcia, Tommy Shane, First Draft

John Cook, a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, has been exploring inoculation for years. He told First Draft that the ideal prebunk will combine “fact and logic so people can understand the facts but also be able to spot attempts to distort the facts.”

“When We Explain the Facts, We Should Also Explain How Misinformation Can Distort Our Facts”

23 June 2021
ALLEA

Dr John Cook (Monash University) is an award-winning scientist and cartoonist who fights climate misinformation with humour and critical thinking. He is also the creative mind behind the Cranky Uncle, a “male, older, white, and politically conservative” caricature of those who are dismissive of climate science according to psychological research. His acclaimed book “Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change” and game app expose misleading techniques of science denial and offer tools to build public resilience against misinformation. His work has not only been used in schools, but he has recently developed a project to counter climate disinformation with Facebook, jointly with other researchers.

e will be one of the contributors to the workshop “Using experiments to fight science disinformation online: an evidence-based guide” at the Future of Science Communication Conference organised by ALLEA and Wissenschaft im Dialog on 24-25 June. Ahead of this conference, he offers some tips and insights on how to combat misinformation in the science communication and education fields.

Communicating climate change, countering denialism, and the importance of scientific consensus

10 June 2021
Ryan Rutherford, Skeptically Curious

In this episode, I spoke to John Cook who, for almost a decade and a half, has tirelessly tried to raise awareness of the seriousness of climate change, to highlight the consensus view among climate scientists, and to combat climate change denialism… I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation with someone who communicates his insights clearly and carefully, and displays a refreshing humility in admitting when he is not fully knowledgeable about a topic. He embodies the kind of intellectual honesty and fundamental decency we need more of in this world.

Inoculate against misinformation

30 May 2021
Julian Morrow, ABC Radio

The Australia Talks survey found 94% of people across all ages and diverse backgrounds agreed that misinformation is a problem for Australia … and 50% said it was a problem for them personally. So how can you inoculate yourself against deception? Research fellow John Cook is working on strategies, including games, to get in front of misinformation.

Using inoculation and critical thinking to counter climate science denial

28 May 2021
Invited talk, Cognitive Challenges of Climate Change Conference, UQAM, Montreal

‘The future of this planet is at stake,’ new report pressures Facebook, YouTube and Twitter to battle climate lies

27 May 2021
Jessica Guynn, USA Today
(article appeared at USA Today, Tech Xplore)

John Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University who is advising Facebook, says social media platforms must quickly develop effective solutions to climate misinformation the way they did for COVID.

“COVID-19 misinformation is an obvious immediate threat and social media platforms were appropriately proactive in quickly responding and stopping it from spreading. Similarly, climate change is an immediate threat as climate impacts are happening here and now, all across society and our environment,” Cook said. “But unlike the pandemic, climate change is going to persist and increase in intensity over time. This underscores why it’s imperative that social media platforms are proactive and urgent in stopping climate misinformation from spreading.”

THINKClima Conference May 2021

27 May 2021
Talk on climate misinformation research at THINKClima conference

Climate change disinformation is evolving. So are efforts to fight back

18 May 2021
Carolyn Gramling, ScienceNews

For this project, Facebook consulted several climate communication experts. Sander van der Linden, a social psychologist at the University of Cambridge, and cognitive scientist John Cook of George Mason University in Fairfax, Va., helped the company develop a new “myth-busting” unit that debunks common climate change myths — such as that scientists don’t agree that global warming is happening.

Cook and van der Linden have also been testing ways to get out in front of disinformation, an approach known as prebunking, or inoculation theory. By helping people recognize common rhetorical techniques used to spread climate disinformation — such as logical fallacies, relying on fake “experts” and cherry-picking only the data that support one view — the two hope to build resilience against these tactics.

How to Spot Pseudoscience Online and IRL

15 May 2021
Jennifer Walter, Discover

One common technique, explains John Cook, a communication researcher at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia, is relying on fake experts to give the impression that a message is scientifically credible. Fake experts are those with academic credentials who, at first glance, seem qualified to speak on an issue. Maybe they have a “Ph.D.” or “Dr.” in their title. But their credentials don’t match or they lack the expertise in the area of science being discussed. Essentially, someone with a doctorate in psychology isn’t necessarily qualified to offer expert insight on astronomy.

How ExxonMobil cleverly blames YOU for climate change

14 May 2021
Mark Kaufman, Mashable

“Blaming consumers for driving climate change has been a highly effective strategy by fossil fuel companies,” said John Cook, a researcher at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Australia who had no role in the new study. “In public and policy discussions about climate solutions, it shifts the focus from transitioning away from fossil fuels, and instead emphasizes how individuals should reduce their personal carbon footprints.”

This won’t achieve much, as far as global temperatures are concerned. “Improving individual efficiency can only achieve a tiny fraction of the emissions reductions required to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, so the strategy has been a convincing red herring,” Cook added.

RepublicEN speaks with John Cook

12 May 2021
Chelsea Henderson, RepublicEN

Have you ever wondered about myth-busting climate change websites and where they came from? Host Chelsea Henderson welcomes skepticalscience.com founder John Cook to the show this week.

How a nonsense story about Joe Biden taking your hamburgers away became red meat for conservatives

28 April 2021
David Bauder & Ali Swenson, Associated Press
(article appeared at Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, and Bellefontaine Examiner)

Once the false claim gets into people’s heads, it’s hard to dislodge. Many targets of the story are unlikely to see fact-checks, said John Cook, a research fellow at the Monash Climate Change Communication Research Hub.

Hayhoe also named John Cook, a professor at George Mason University who got a Ph.D. in misinformation “so he could stand up for the truth,” as someone she admires. Cook has launched Cranky Uncle, an app that uses cartoons and critical thinking to fight misinformation, and also started skepticalscience.com, where he refutes global warming and climate change myths with scientific data. The site currently contains 242 arguments.

The Science of Climate Change Explained: Facts, Evidence and Proof

19 April 2021
Julia Rosen, New York Times

Climate denialists often point to these natural climate changes as a way to cast doubt on the idea that humans are causing climate to change today. However, that argument rests on a logical fallacy. It’s like “seeing a murdered body and concluding that people have died of natural causes in the past, so the murder victim must also have died of natural causes,” a team of social scientists wrote in The Debunking Handbook, which explains the misinformation strategies behind many climate myths.

‘Climate zombies’ want to infect your brain with misinformation

16 April 2021
John Cook & Rick Knight, Chicago Daily Herald

Now the U.S. has a new set of leaders who seem ready to take serious action on climate. So, of course, just like the zombies of horror movies, the climate contrarians will rise again.

Their target is your brain. Watch for them on TV and radio, in newspapers, and — most of all — on the internet, dishing out distortions, falsehoods, red herrings, logical fallacies and plain old lies about energy, weather and the very foundations of climate science.

They’ll falsely blame power outages on renewable energy, as they did recently in Texas. They’ll claim that “climate has always changed,” but hide the fact that it’s now changing thousands of times faster. They’ll claim that global warming can’t be “blamed” for extreme weather, although in reality it contributes more and more each year.

The climate zombies will return. But you can render them harmless by consulting trusted scientific messengers like NASA, the National Academies, Skeptical Science and the American Chemical Society. You can inoculate yourself against misinformation by learning the rhetorical techniques of science denial. Protect your brain from the zombies with science and critical thinking.

Top climate leaders will participate in Big Oil-sponsored “sustainability” conference

14 April 2021
Emily Atkin, Heated

John Cook, a research fellow with Monash University’s Climate Change Communication Research Hub, said viewers of the event should be “on high alert, keeping in mind the types of redirection strategies these groups have implemented in the past.”

Those strategies include greenwashing the industry’s climate commitments to seem bigger than they really are, and “arguments focused on blaming individuals, which distract from the systemic change that’s really needed.”

Facebook’s New Target in the Misinformation War: Climate Lies

13 April 2021
Kurt Wagner, Bloomberg Green
(article also on Hindustan Times)

Experts say the info center is a good effort but only a start. Oreskes still thinks Facebook should remove climate misinformation entirely. Quran wants Facebook to retroactively notify people if they’ve previously seen misinformation by putting alerts in their feed. “If the goal is addressing misinformation, just providing facts is not an adequate solution,” says John Cook, a research fellow at the Climate Change Communication Research Hub at Monash University in Melbourne. He also consulted on Facebook’s effort without pay. “But I think they recognize that themselves.”

Why COVID-19 conspiracy theories persist

6 April 2021
David Klepper, Associated Press
(article appeared at PBS Newshour, WWNYTV)

“People need big explanations for big problems, for big world events,” said John Cook, a cognitive scientist and conspiracy theory expert at Monash University in Australia. “Random explanations — like bats, or wet markets — are just psychologically unsatisfying.”

This drive is so strong, Cook said, that people often believe contradictory conspiracy theories. Roberts said his parents, for instance, initially thought COVID-19 was linked to cell towers, before deciding the virus was actually a hoax. The only explanations they didn’t entertain, he said, were the ones coming from medical experts.

Optimism in leadership with John Cook

24 March 2021
Amber Spurway, University of Queensland

In part two of our episode on optimism in leadership, we hear from John Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University in Virginia, USA. We will explore what he believes makes a good leader, the role of optimism in leadership and how to effectively exert positive influence.

North American Carbon Program Open Science Meeting

20 March 2021
North American Carbon Program

Connecting People With Credible Climate Change Information

18 February 2021
Facebook

“Developing rebuttals based on the best-practices from communication research is an important step towards countering online misinformation, and I look forward to exploring more solutions.” — Dr. John Cook, George Mason University

Facebook expands program to fight climate lies

18 February 2021
Ben German, Axios

John Cook, a George Mason University expert in climate communication working with Facebook, said research shows that simply saying information is wrong is not enough. “You also have to explain why or how it is wrong. That is important from a psychological point of view,” Cook said of the new “myth-busting” section of the climate portal.

Planetary Alignment Didn’t End the World in 1919. But One Professor Thought It Would

10 February 2021
Jennifer Walter, Discover

Often throughout history, societal stress and conspiracy theories go hand in hand. “When society is more disruptive, those are more fertile conditions for conspiracy theories,” explains John Cook, a professor of psychology at George Mason University in Virginia. “I think we’re just more vulnerable or primed to believing in conspiracies under those conditions.”

The Psychology Behind Conspiracy Theories

9 February 2021
Beth Ann Mayer, Healthline

“When people feel threatened and out of control, it’s natural to want to feel more control and bring order to the randomness by resorting to conspiracy theories,” says John Cook, PhD, founder of the website Skeptical Science and co-author of “The Conspiracy Theory Handbook.”

Twitter thinks ads about climate change are bad. Big Oil’s disinformation is fine, though.

4 February 2021
Emily Atkin, MSNBC

“Corporations — including social media platforms — need to take climate misinformation as seriously as they take election and Covid misinformation,” John Cook, an assistant research professor at George Mason University who studies climate disinformation, told me. “A long-term problem like climate change cuts both ways — it may seem less immediate now, but it also means we’ll be suffering the consequences of today’s decisions for decades to come.”

Combining Psychology, Critical Thinking, and Gamification to Counter Science Misinformation

4 February 2021
Webinar for the Cyberpsychology Center

Twitter Bots Are a Major Source of Climate Disinformation

22 January 2021
Corbin Hiar, Scientific American

The reason Twitter and other platforms haven’t taken that step, Cook said, is because there are financial incentives to ignore the problem.

“Generally speaking, misinformation is good business,” he said.

“Misinformation is more likely to be clicked and liked because it tends to be more sticky,” Cook explained. “And the business model of social media platforms are likes and clicks and shares: The more an item gets interaction, the more money a platform makes.”

The Coming Ice Age

18 January 2021
Jeb Cardand Blake Smith, In reSearch Of

Jeb and Blake are joined by climate scientist Dr. John Cook to discuss this infamous episode of In Search Of…

You may have noticed that since the 1970s we did not descend into a frozen ice age. In fact – quite the opposite. Dr. Cook was kind enough to join us to talk about both the history of the science discussed in this episode, and the many challenges of dealing with science denialism. It’s a treat of a discussion.

How One Campaign Illustrates COVID-19 Denialists’ Disinformation Tactics

11 January 2021
David Oliver, Byline Times

In a story about COVID-19 conspiracy theorists and denialists published at the weekend, The Times referred to an online group demanding the repeal of the Coronavirus Act 2020. …the arguments that this particular group make provide a handy illustration of the tactics of disinformation often employed by such movements. These range from demonstrably false assertions, to irrelevant, partial or exaggerated information taken out of context, or quotes from individuals who are not recognised experts with credibility among their peers.

These tactics come straight from a playbook brilliantly described by the Skeptical Science blog: A History of FLICC: The 5 Techniques of Science Denial.

Flattening the Infodemic Curve

8 January 2021
Celine Gounder, Epidemic Podcast

Combating misinformation has become more important than ever during the pandemic. The novel coronavirus, social media, and a polarized political environment created something public health experts have dubbed an “infodemic” — a flood of misleading information and conspiracy theories about the coronavirus and the public response to it. In this episode of EPIDEMIC, we’ll hear how misinformation spreads online, share some tips on how to spot it, and find out what needs to change to keep misinformation from causing serious harm.

COVID-19 vaccines lies and hoaxes: How to inoculate yourself, family and friends against deadly misinformation

6 January 2021
Jessica Guynn, USA Today

“While we now have COVID-19 vaccines, we also have a vaccine against COVID-19 misinformation – critical thinking,” said John Cook, who heads the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University.

Creative Climate: Climate Games

5 January 2021
Treesong, Creative Climate

Cranky Uncle is a game app about a cranky uncle who is always spouting off climate denial talking points. The game uses cartoons and critical thinking to fight misinformation. It was developed by George Mason University scientist John Cook (of Skeptical Science fame), in collaboration with creative agency Autonomy. It’s available on both the App Store and Google Play.

This game is a great example of the innoculation approach to fighting misinformation. Players are exposed to “weakened doses” of misinformation in a gamified context that rewards them for recognizing and rejecting said information. It’s fun, it’s informative, and it may actually help people who are susceptible to logical fallacies and misinformation related to climate change and other issues.

Greens track deniers ahead of Biden climate push

4 January 2021
Corbin Hiar, E&E News

While climate deniers are currently promoting misinformation around other topics, experts expect them to ramp up their attacks on climate science as soon as the Biden administration or lawmakers begin advancing efforts to curb emissions.

John Cook, a professor at George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication, has seen that pattern play out in the past. He helped develop a machine-learning program that could detect and document online climate misinformation over the last few decades.

“What we find is a surge in misinformation the closer you get to some substantive policy,” Cook said in an interview.

He anticipates climate deniers will play a similar role in the coming months and years.

“The closer that the Biden administration gets to actually passing or promoting any kind of climate policy, you will see a surge of misinformation to try to cast doubt on it, malign it, and erode public support for it as well as bolster the opposition, such as Republican leaders,” Cook predicted.

Covid-19 and Climate Change Will Remain Inextricably Linked, Thanks to the Parallels (and the Denial)

1 January 2021
Ilana Cohen, Inside Climate News

When the pandemic swept over the nation in March, John Cook thought many people would register the threat of Covid-19 more readily than that of climate change.

“Climate change is challenging as a topic because of the psychological distance…which causes people to be less concerned about it,” said Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University and founder of the climate science blog and information resource Skeptical Science.

Deaths from Covid-19 were right on people’s doorstep and, Cook assumed, would be harder to ignore. But this initial assumption was quickly proven wrong, at least to some extent.

With the spread of Covid-19, a new wave of denial surfaced, one that Cook said was similar to the denialism seen in response to the science of human-caused climate change. Political conservatism and individualism, he said, ranked among the strongest predictors of people’s likelihood to express skepticism about public health measures such as social distancing.

“In the end, Covid took the same trajectory of climate change,” said Cook, “but over a six-month period as opposed to several decades.”

2020 has been a bleak year in the climate crisis. So here’s the good news

31 December 2020
Louise Boyle, Independent

“One of the most positive climate developments in 2020 was when the IEA declared solar the cheapest electricity in history. A common myth from opponents of climate action is that renewables are too expensive. This argument has always been flawed as it ignores the costs of failing to act on climate change. But over time, the argument has become even more untenable as the price of renewables continued to rapidly fall. The case for transitioning from fossil fuels to renewables can be made for environmental and economic reasons.”

Warming Trends: The ‘Cranky Uncle’ Game, Good News About Bowheads and Steps to a Speedier Energy Transition

19 December 2020
Inside Climate News

In “Cranky Uncle,” a free phone app game, cartoonist-turned-scientist John Cook offers ways to identify and combat misinformation on climate change and other topics.

Cook, a researcher at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University, combined his expertise in climate denialism with the artistic skills he gained in his previous career as a cartoonist to create the game.

Players are guided by a science-denying Cranky Uncle cartoon character through five disinformation techniques often used by people who doubt the science of topics like climate change, evolution, vaccines or Covid-19.

New Cranky Uncle Game Teaches Players How To Destroy Climate Myths By Creating Them

18 December 2020
Daily Kos

We’re talking of course about this week’s release of the Cranky Unclegame from Dr. John Cook of George Mason University, which uses humor and cartoons to show people how disinformation is constructed, thereby making them less likely to be fooled by it. “If you want to learn how to spot someone cheating at cards,” Dr. Cook explained, “first, you have to learn how to cheat at cards.”

The game (on iPhone now, Android soon) teaches players the tools and tricks of disinformation in a quest to become the best Cranky Uncle in denial of climate science or vaccines or any other sort of deliberately created myths. While few are eager to sit for a lecture on propaganda or disinformation, this novel and scientifically-verified approach, Cook says, seeks to “engage players and get them practising critical thinking through gameplay.”

Big Name Climate Deniers Aren’t Joining Conspiracy Theory-Friendly Parler — Yet

17 December 2020
Phoebe Cooke, Desmog UK

Parler’s apparent lack of appeal to some of the most influential of mainstream climate science sceptics may be explained by the platform’s lack of shock factor, explains John Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University.

Cook says there are two main variables determining the activity of online trolls: “How hard is it to troll and how much can they enflame (or misinform) people.”

“While Parler lowers the barrier to trolling – by failing to fact-check misinformation – the capacity to enflame is reduced because the platform is only inhabited by like-minded conspiracy theorists,” he said. “Relative to larger platforms like Twitter, Parler is a small echo chamber and the inability to gain widespread attention makes it less attractive to science deniers.”

The new game ‘Cranky Uncle’ is a vaccine against fake news

15 December 2020
Kate Yoder, Grist

Research shows that exposing people to weakened doses of misinformation can teach them to identify it, similar to how a vaccine coaches immune systems how to deal with a virus. And instead of getting a shot, you get to play a game.

Cranky Uncle, an app released on Tuesday, uses this approach to teach people the ins and outs of anti-science propaganda — you know, the kind of myths that convince people climate change is a Chinese hoax. The game’s namesake Cranky Uncle is a cartoon figure that represents conspiracy-spouting uncles everywhere. He mentors you to become a science denier, just like him. He teaches you all about his favorite logical fallacies and the techniques he uses to dismiss scientific evidence, like impossible expectations (“Until we find all missing links, we can’t be confident in the theory of evolution”) and fake experts (“Relax! I have a bachelor in computer science!” says a cartoon doctor as he takes a saw to a very worried-looking Cranky Uncle).

As you giggle at silly jokes and learn how to rebut his arguments, Cranky Uncle gets crankier and crankier. Throughout the game, you get quizzed on your ability to spot logical fallacies and false arguments, improving your critical thinking skills.

Mason climate communication researcher’s smartphone game helps combat misinformation

14 December 2020
John Hollis, George Mason University

“Misinformation does great damage to society,” Cook said. “An essential solution is making the public more resilient against fake news. But how? Gamification is a powerful approach that can potentially reach many millions of people.”

The game uses a resilience-building technique known as active inoculation. In the game, players are mentored by a cartoon Cranky Uncle, who is dismissive of scientific evidence on climate change, vaccines, COVID-19 and other issues. As players learn the techniques used to deny science, they gain points on their quest to become a cranky uncle.

Global Warming, Critical Thinking, and Misinformation Inoculation

9 December 2020
Intelligent Speculation

It’s only fake-believe: how to deal with a conspiracy theorist

29 November 2020
David Robson, The Guardian

The fact that 5G arrived at roughly the same time as coronavirus, for instance, is not evidence that its electromagnetic waves caused the disease. As Cook points out, the character Baby Yoda also arrived in late 2019 – but who would claim that he had caused widespread illness?

Making sense of your climate-denying cranky uncle

25 November 2020
John Cook, Bulletin of Atomic Scientists

One challenge at Thanksgiving dinner is your climate-denying cranky uncle. You’re likely to hear a string of arguments from how cold it was last Tuesday to the whole field of climate science being a hoax.

How do you make sense of your cranky uncle’s arguments? Is there any rationality in irrational science denial? There are two main ways to respond to climate misinformation. Both are effective and ideally, a combination of the two is recommended. But one approach is particularly powerful, equipping you to make sense of misinformation across many topics, not just climate change.

For $25K, you can publish climate denial in The Washington Post

18 November 2020
Emily Atkin, Heated

Gelman’s ad is a textbook example of scientific misinformation, said John Cook, an assistant research professor at George Mason University who studies climate misinformation, said it contained “some of the most egregious misinformation I’ve seen over the last decade and a half that I’ve been researching climate misinformation.”

The majority of the ad “contains common talking points that have been well debunked, over and over, for decades,” Cook said. Dessler agreed, and pointed to two articles debunking most of them. Dessler said there were “a few crumbs of truth” in the ad, like the fact that H2O is the most important greenhouse gas in our atmosphere. But then, “they are then blended with nonsense to reach very wrong conclusions.” Cook said at least one argument was novel. “Until now, I’d never heard a climate denier argue that carbon dioxide blocks sunlight from warming the Earth,” he said. “That displays woeful ignorance of how the greenhouse effect works.”

John Cook discusses the seven traits of conspiratorial thinking and how conspiracy theories are immune to evidence

11 November 2020
PropWatch

Dr. John Cook, of George Mason University, discusses seven traits of conspiratorial thinking and their relation to the video Plandemic, which promotes a grand conspiracy around the COVID-19 pandemic. Among these traits, he highlights how conspiracy believers tend to have an unshakeable suspicion for any and all official accounts and sense of heroic victimhood. He also discusses how conspiracy theories are immune to evidence, since any lack of evidence to prove a conspiracy can always be interpreted as more proof of how well the conspiracy was executed.

A Right-Wing Think Tank Is Behind the Controversial Great Barrington Declaration Calling for COVID-19 Herd Immunity

26 October 2020
Dana Drugmand, Desmog

“Science misinformation has a long history of parading lists of seeming experts rejecting the scientific consensus,” said Dr. John Cook, a research assistant professor studying science denial at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University. “The tobacco industry perfected this approach, with newspaper ads featuring thousands of doctors endorsing a cigarette brand. Climate deniers compiled a list of tens of thousands of dissenting science graduates, whose numbers paled compared to the total number of people with a science degree. The ‘Great Barrington Declaration’ also uses the misleading technique of ‘magnified minority,’ promoting a list of names to convey the impression of scientific support when the vast bulk of relevant scientific experts says differently. Science denial employs the same rhetorical techniques, whether on the topics of smoking, climate change, or COVID-19.”

War on NOAA? A Climate Denier’s Arrival Raises Fears the Agency’s Climate Mission Is Under Attack

25 October 2020
Marianne Lavelle, Inside Climate News

Soon, a scientist with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, became a frequent collaborator with Legates. They published a paper together in 2015 that challenged influential research showing that 97.1 percent of the peer-reviewed climate science papers published from 1991 to 2011 endorsed the consensus position that humans are the cause of global warming. Legates and Soon argued that only scientific papers that specifically quantified the level of human contribution to climate change—a criterion that would include only 41 papers, or 0.3 percent of the total—should be considered to endorse the consensus position.

“By that logic, there is zero percent consensus on heliocentrism—that the Earth is revolving around the sun—because not a single recent astronomy paper states, ‘the Earth is revolving around the sun,'” said John Cook, lead author of the 97 percent consensus paper, now at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University. In other words, the human contribution to climate change is so widely accepted that it is implicit in most published research.

A guide to overcoming COVID-19 misinformation

22 October 2020
Sarah Gibbens, National Geographic

One of the biggest predictors of whether someone is likely to disavow climate change or COVID-19 is political affiliation. Cook’s research has shown that political leaders can significantly influence a person’s attitude about climate change, and he suspects the same is true for COVID-19.

For example, a number of polls and think tank research show an overwhelming majority of Democrats are more likely to take COVID-19 seriously, wear masks, and social distance, while a minority of Republicans are likely to do the same. This political polarization was an “avoidable tragedy,” Cook says, pointing to President Donald Trump’s early and persistent dismissal of wearing masks and social distancing as major factors driving today’s partisan divide.

“When our tribal leaders send us cues, the tribe tends to move in that direction,” Cook says. “Leadership matters.”

“I’m certainly not a scientist”: Amy Coney Barrett’s views on climate change – and why it matters

16 October 2020
Jeff Berardelli, CBS News

But Cook, who produced one of the most cited studies on the scientific consensus about climate change, says that among practicing climate scientists, agreement that climate change is happening and is caused by humans is greater than 97 percent.

“Climate change, COVID, and smoking are directly analogous situations as in each issue there is scientific consensus. In fact, the scientific consensus on climate change is stronger because the level of scrutiny into expert agreement on climate change is unprecedented,” he said.

“Virtually every relevant scientific body in the world, including the National Academies of Sciences from 80 countries, has endorsed human-caused global warming,” Cook said. In fact, in January of this year 11,000 scientists worldwide released an urgent message in the journal BioScience from Oxford, stating: “We declare clearly and unequivocally that planet Earth is facing a climate emergency.”

Resources for adults who think climate science is controversial

15 October 2020
Mark Kaufman, Mashable

Yes, there will always be some debate among the public about most anything. That doesn’t mean the main premises of climate science are factually debatable. People still debate whether or not the Earth is flat (you decide). You can’t escape public debate, especially in a world rife with erroneous ideas posted on social media and TV pundits making absurd arguments. Such will be the case for any scientific field.

“There’s still a handful [of people] that deny plate tectonics,” noted John Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University. “Even ‘flat earth’ is making a comeback.”

How to fight fake news about climate change with Prof. John Cook

15 October 2020
Talk for Trinity College, Dublin

Covid, Climate and Denial

7 October 2020
Lisa Friedman, New York Times

John Cook has spent the past decade studying the psychology of climate denialists and the past few months trying to understand their ideological cousins: people who scoff at the coronavirus.

Mr. Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University and founder of the Skeptical Science, a website that debunks common arguments by climate change deniers, said the parallels between the two groups are striking. In both cases, he said, being confronted with technical facts appears to have little effect.

“Ideology is a big predictor of people’s attitudes about climate change, but tribalism is even more so,” he said. “Ultimately humans are social animals. If my tribe believes that climate change is a hoax, I’m much more likely to believe that. And that’s definitely also at play with Covid.”

What Happens When Climate Change Denialism and Wildfires Collide

6 October 2020
Slate, Ashley Braun

Given that climate deniers are more likely to ascribe to conspiracy theories in general, reject expert knowledge, and distrust institutions, it’s easier to understand their embrace of the ideas that scientists are duping the public over human-caused climate change or that left-wing arsonists are at work in Oregon’s fires. “If the scientific community says human-caused global warming is exacerbating wildfires, how do you explain that?” says George Mason University climate communication researcher John Cook. “They’re either all wrong in the same direction accidentally, or they’re all colluding to deceive us. [Science deniers] opt for the latter.”

Fighting Back Against Climate Disinformation and Intimidation, with John Cook and Lauren Kurtz

5 October 2020
Ramesh Laungani, Warm Regards podcast

Inoculation theory basically takes the idea of vaccination and applies it to knowledge. You can help people build up resistance against misinformation by exposing them to a weak form of misinformation. And what I mean by a weak form of misinformation is by saying, well, here is this myth and here is the technique that it uses. So you’re delivering it in a weakened form. And once they understand that technique, then they are less vulnerable to being misled by that technique.

Don’t Expect Trump’s Diagnosis to Change the Minds of Pandemic Skeptics

2 October 2020
Joe Pinsker, The Atlantic

Perhaps even more important than Trump’s condition will be how he communicates about it. “A key driver of COVID-19 denial among Trump voters has been verbal cues from Trump, such as questioning the severity of the disease and mocking mask wearing,” said John Cook, a researcher at George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication. “My guess is Trump will minimize his symptoms both to portray an impression of physical strength and downplay the severity of COVID … So I’m not optimistic [that his test result] will make much difference.”

The 12 Arguments Every Climate Denier Uses – and How to Debunk Them

25 September 2020
Imogen West-Knights, VICE

This narrative first came from the fossil fuel industry. “They funded carbon footprint calculators,” Dr John Cook, a research professor at the Centre for Climate Change Communication, tells me, “and my hat off to them for coming up with an incredibly effective PR strategy to distract the public from the real need, to transform how we create energy.”

Facebook’s climate of denial

21 September 2020
Emily Atkin, HEATED

“I see it as a greenwashing exercise,” said John Cook, an assistant research professor at George Mason University who studies climate misinformation. “Facebook is polluting the information landscape by allowing misinformation to proliferate from their platform. And they’re trying to distract from the fact that they’re not doing anything to prevent it.”

Facebook launched a new climate information hub. Here’s how activists reacted

20 September 2020
Joseph Winters, Salon

“Supplying facts is necessary but insufficient in our fight against misinformation,” tweeted John Cook, a research assistant professor at the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication. “To adequately deal with the problem of climate misinformation, Facebook should proactively stop disinformation spreading on their platform.”

The hidden political forces pushing pandemic conspiracies

18 September 2020
ABC Radio National

ABC technology reporter Ariel Bogle (@arielbogle)examines how conspiracies blend, and how they can serve the geopolitical interests of nation states with nefarious intentions.

Environmentalists pan Facebook’s new climate change hub

16 September 2020
Irina Ivanova, CBS News

Nearly 70% of Americans use Facebook, and 4 in 10 rely on it for news, according to Pew. And because Facebook’s business model is based on keeping users on its platform for as long as possible and encouraging users to participate, the company has a vested interest in keeping polarizing content on its service even when it’s false, Cook said.

“Misinformation is good for business,” he said. Unless Facebook were to actively go after fake news, the information hub would be “totally inadequate,” Cook added. “It’s like poisoning somebody and then giving them a brochure on vegetables.”

Facebook says it’s cracking down on climate change misinformation. Scientists say it’s not doing enough.

15 September 2020
Jessica Guynn, USA Today

If anything, the success of Facebook’s COVID-19 Information Center which has directed more than 2 billion people to information from health authorities shows that the company has not been limited by technology but by a lack of will, according to John Cook, a research assistant professor at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University.

“At best, they have been slow to react to climate misinformation,” Cook said in an email. “At worst, they have actively reversed fact-checking efforts by climate experts, consciously enabling climate denial organizations to continue to publish their misinformation.”

The Loophole Allowing Climate Change Denial to Spread On Facebook

21 August 2020
Tristan Kennedy, VICE

His research has identified “five techniques of science denial”, categorised by the acronym FLICC, “which stands for Fake experts, Logical fallacies, Impossible expectations, Cherry picking and Conspiracy theories”.

Of these, Dr Cook says, by far the most effective is the “fake experts” strategy. It’s particularly effective when it’s spread among older people on social media, he says, “because humans are social animals, so social arguments are the most effective”. He singles out the demon-sperm doctors as the perfect example. “They were highly persuasive to some of the population – throw people in a white coat and they look like an expert.”

When that video was flagged, Facebook took action – which only serves to make its refusal to act on climate misinformation even more stark.

‘Everybody’s entitled to their opinion – but not their own facts’: The spread of climate denial on Facebook

24 July 2020
Louise Boyle, The Independent

Through his research, Dr Cook has found that climate misinformation that is spread on social media disproportionately affects conservatives and has little impact on liberals.

“Status quo is a win for climate deniers. If they prevent people from accepting climate change or acting to do something about it, they’ve succeeded,” he said.

He said that a defining characteristic of the misinformation was the attacks on scientists, and on the science itself.

“The misinformation arguments are that people can’t trust scientists, can’t trust models, can’t trust climate data. It’s all about building doubt and undermining public trust in climate science.”

Inside Ideas interview

21 July 2020
Marc Buckley, Inside Ideas

To help shift the needle on climate action, Dr Cook is a pioneer in pushing a blend of science, technology and art to communicate ideas to the wider public. The award-winning scientist, who wrote the acclaimed book: Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change, is a trailblazer in combining science, critical thinking, and cartoons to explain and counter climate misinformation.

Coronavirus: Conspiracy Theories

20 July 2020
John Oliver, Last Week Tonight

If it’s not the cars, it’s the cows

12 July 2020
Dr Paul Winston, The Gisborne Herald

First the basics. Assistant Professor John Cook from George Mason University summarises a complex topic wonderfully in 10 words: It’s real. It’s us. It’s bad. Experts agree. There’s hope.

How do I convince others?

10 July 2020
The Bad Environmentalist

Countering Misinformation with Guest John Cook

4 July 2020
Thinking Clearly podcast

Bob and Julia talk strategies for recognizing and combating misinformation with psychologist and cartoonist Dr. John Cook from George Mason University. Dr Cook, a specialist in countering science denial, discusses various methods of inoculation against misinformation and the uses of cartoons, humor, and educational games to counter misinformation and build public resilience against it.

Fake news is killing us. How can we stop it?

1 July 2020
Kate Yoder, Grist

…the best way to counter fake news might be to equip people with the tools to evaluate what’s fake and what’s real from the get-go. “It’s better to inoculate people preemptively against conspiracy theories rather than trying to go in afterward and undo the damage,” said Cook, a professor at George Mason University, in a recent interview with The Verge.

Navigating conversations with climate change deniers? Read this book.

30 June 2020
Lin Andrews, National Center for Science Education

This new (and greatly humorous) how-to book on responding to climate science deniers is a great, informative read for anyone trying to figure out how to navigate conversational landmines that often occur both in and out of the classroom. The book of cartoon illustrations, full of humor and insight, examines the plethora of basic misconceptions about climate change often expressed by our own versions of cranky uncles.

Since I work with Cook on a regular basis developing NCSE’s misconception-busting lesson plans, I might be accused of bias. However, as a former teacher, I can objectively say that Cook’s new book is an incredible educational resource for handling difficult situations that often arise when teaching about climate change, as I’ve met my own share of climate deniers throughout my career.

The Conspiracy Theory Handbook

28 June 2020
Blurry Photos Podcast

Flora invited the authors of The Conspiracy Theory Handbook, Dr. Stephan Lewandowsky and Dr. John Cook, on the podcast to discuss their recent work. A powerful little tool breaking down the ins and outs of conspiratorial thinking, The Conspiracy Theory Handbook seeks to inform on how to better engage in critical thinking. David has a large handful of questions for the gentlemen. It’s a fascinating discussion into how conspiracies can be approached and how to engage theorists and those who aren’t sure what to think. Give the episode a listen and then go read the Handbook for yourself!

Busting Climate Myths : The Psychology of Denial

21 June 2020
Dave Borlace, Just Have A Think

8 June 2020
Lenora Chu, Christian Science Monitor

Ultimately, the solution must include stronger critical thinking by individuals, argues Mr. Cook, the climate change communications researcher. People must constantly ask themselves, “What kind of filters do I use? What stereotypes do I have when I consume information? Where did this information come from?”

There are signs that people going online are doing this mental work. A Pew Research Center survey in 2018 showed 78% of Americans prefer news from sources without a partisan slant, up 14 points from five years ago. Last year, a Pew survey also found more Americans were concerned about made-up news than about climate change, racism, illegal immigration, and terrorism.

“The public intolerance for misinformation, and the danger of it, is so much stronger now than before,” says Mr. Cook. “The pandemic is a terrible situation, but there’s potentially the opportunity to build a new public resilience” on the foundations of new public awareness.

CBC Interview about COVID conspiracy theories

6 June 2020
CBC News

How to Keep COVID-19 Conspiracies Contained

6 June 2020
Julia Rosen, Scientific American

Along with COVID-19, something else is spreading across America: conspiracy theories. In the dark alleys of the Internet, people have concocted a dizzying array of unfounded explanations for the pandemic.

The phenomenon doesn’t surprise John Cook, a cognitive scientist at George Mason University.

“When people feel threatened, when they feel out of control, when they feel like random events are sweeping over them, they are more vulnerable or likely to gravitate toward conspiracy theories, because it gives people a sense of control. We’re just uncomfortable with randomness. Humans are pattern detectors. We need meaning; we need control; we need to know that there is a system—there’s an order to how the world works.”

How to Spot a Conspiracy Theory

14 May 2020
Beth Skwarecki, Lifehacker

To understand the hallmarks of a conspiracy theory that exists only to prop itself up, this Conspiracy Theory Handbook explains the difference, and gives a handy list of red flags to watch out for (with the mnemonic “CONSPIR”):
Contradictory ideas: Ideas that conflict with each other are absorbed into the theory even though if one were true, another would have to be false.
Overriding suspicion: People who have bought into a conspiracy theory will discount official sources out of hand, regardless of their content.
Nefarious intent: The powers that run these supposed conspiracies never have a boring (or benign) motivation.
“Something must be wrong”: Even if you can disprove a piece of information that supports the theory, believers will still believe the theory because of a sense that something must be wrong here.
Persecuted victim: People held up as heroes are also framed as victims. If the supposed whistleblower turns out to be a fraud, that’s just because the conspiracy is trying to discredit them.
Immune to evidence: Any evidence that seems to contradict the conspiracy theory will be reinterpreted by believers as lies whose existence proves that people in power are trying to discredit the theory—which in turn strengthens their belief in the theory.
Reinterpreting randomness: Happenings that have nothing to do with the substance of the conspiracy theory will be interpreted as if they are somehow related.

With No Clear Movement, Mountain Biking’s Climate Crisis Stands to Worsen

5 May 2020
Matt Coté, Bike Mag

While surfing, climbing, skiing, and snowboarding have all formed substantial movements around the environment (like Protect Our Winters), mountain biking has yet to. Not necessarily climate deniers (no one’s done that survey) our inaction isn’t so much an individual problem as a group one. That’s all very familiar to John Cook, a PhD in cognitive science who’s a researcher for the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University.

“I think that, generally, people fall into the misconception that climate change is distant,” he explains when I reach him by phone. “And distant in a number of different ways. Either geographically distant, or temporally distant—something that’s going to happen in the future or in a different part of the world. Or socially distant in the sense that they think it’s going to happen to other people.”

Why dangerous conspiracy theories about the virus spread so fast — and how they can be stopped

1 May 2020
Travis Andrews, Washington Post
(unpaywalled version available at The Philadelphia Inquirer)

A “calamitous event” like the pandemic creates a “very fertile breeding ground for conspiracy theories,” said John Cook, an expert on misinformation with George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication.
…
“When people feel threatened or out of control or they’re trying to explain a big significant event, they’re more vulnerable or prone to turning to conspiracy theories to explain them,” Cook said. “Somewhat counterintuitively, it gives people more sense of control to imagine that, rather than random things happening, there are these shadowy groups and agencies that are controlling it. Randomness is very discomforting to people.”

The Rise of the Grand Unified Conspiracy Theories in the Age of Coronavirus

29 Apr 2020
Niveen Ghoneim, Egyptian Streets

According to The Conspiracy Theory Handbook by Stephan Lewandowsky and John Cook, skepticism is a natural stage of the conventional thinking process where only facts inform conclusions. Conspiratorial thinking, on the other hand, is marked by overriding suspicion and a tendency to dismiss facts and evidence that don’t fit predetermined outcomes.

Climate science deniers at forefront of downplaying coronavirus pandemic

25 Apr 2020
Emily Holden, The Guardian

John Cook, who studies climate denial at the center for climate change communication at George Mason University, said he expected the overlap but was surprised by the extent of the parallels.

“People who are politically conservative and who value individual rights over collective responsibility are less supporting of social distancing policies and also just have a lower understanding of the dangers of Covid-19,” Cook said, citing emerging polling data.

Cook outlines five techniques of science denial that people should watch for, including the cherry-picking of data.

“The latest argument that we should relax social distancing because the curve [of cases] is flattening is very much an example of cherry-picking,” Cook said.

Earth Day at 50: Pandemic Highlights Challenges Amid Progress

22 Apr 2020
Stephen Lee, Bloomberg

At the time of the first Earth Day, many scientists already understood the link between greenhouse gas emissions and a warming planet. That work was kick-started in the late 1960s, with the rise of the first numerical simulation models of the global climate, said Naomi Oreskes, a climate science professor at Harvard University.

But no broad consensus had yet formed. Some early theories argued that particulate matter could have a cooling effect because particles reflect sunlight, said John Cook, a research assistant professor at George Mason University’s Center for Climate Change Communication.

People: Earth Day Special

17 Apr 2020

Covid-19 conspiracy theories are spreading faster than the virus

4 Apr 2020
Stella Levantesi, il manifesto

Stephan Lewandowsky, a psychologist and the head of the Department of Cognitive Psychology at the University of Bristol, and John Cook, a cognitive scientist and researcher at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University, have studied the causes and dynamics of conspiracy theories and have created a sort of handbook for “navigating” conspiracy-laden thinking.

According to Lewandowsky and Cook, conspiracy theories are characterized by seven main features, which they summarized by the acronym CONSPIR, which stands for Contradictory, Overriding suspicion, Nefarious intent, Something must be wrong, Persecuted victim, Immune to evidence and Re-interpreting randomness.

Citing Virus Misinformation, South Africa Tests Speech Limits

3 Apr 2020
Sarah Wild, Undark

John Cook, a researcher at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University in Virginia, explores climate change misinformation, and said in areas where there is consensus, being forced to include dissenting voices endangers the public. In a 2017 paper, Cook showed that including arguments from climate denialists reduced public acceptance that global warming was happening. This has made people less likely to act to curb climate change. But, he said, there are also areas where the science is fairly new — “and that is where you need to be more careful.”

Mysterious Forces and Mythical Creatures in Coronavirus Conspiracy Theories

29 Mar 2020
Morocco World News

Conspiracy theories feed on uncertainty and in return help create more of it, which is why they are especially dangerous in current times of a crisis. Fortunately, there are quite simple ways a reader can use to verify the veracity of a read. According to “The Conspiracy Theory Handbook,” created by cognitive scientists Stephan Lewandowsky and John Cook, there are four questions worth asking oneself before deeming something as true or false:

1. Do I recognize the news organization that posted the story?
2. Does the information in the post seem believable?
3. Is the post written in a style that I expect from a professional news organization?
4. Is the post politically motivated?

‘Misinformation kills’: The link between coronavirus conspiracies and climate denial

28 Mar 2020
Shannon Osaka, Grist

John Cook, professor of cognitive science at George Mason University, argues that social identity also play a role. “In the case of climate change, several studies have found that ‘elite cues,’ or just cues from political leaders, are one of the biggest drivers of changes in attitudes,” he said. That is, if President Trump downplays the risk of climate change or the coronavirus, his supporters and an entire media ecosystem are likely to follow close behind.

For a brief moment last Monday, it seemed as though these “elite cues” from members of the Republican party might be about to shift. A more somber President Trump spoke to reporters encouraging social distancing and limiting gatherings of more than ten people. On Tuesday, however, he switched tack, arguing that the country should reopen “by Easter” and implying that the coronavirus was no more dangerous than the seasonal flu. “It’s like partisanship was knocked back a little bit, but it rallied,” said Cook.

Coronavirus shows how to fight disinformation about climate change

26 Mar 2020
Jeremy Deaton, Fast Company

“The big difference between coronavirus and climate change is that people’s bullshit detectors are on high alert on this issue compared to climate change,” says John Cook, a cognitive psychologist at the George Mason University Center for Climate Change Communication and co-author of a new handbook on how to debunk conspiracy theories. “They just have a much lower tolerance for misinformation—both the public and the media.”

Book Review: “Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change”

24 Mar 2020
Terri Schlichenmeyer, Rushville Republican

Understanding “Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change” takes conscious thought, openness, maturity, and patience. If you possess those traits, are 15-or-older, and have an activist’s heart, you’ll love this book. If not, its usefulness to you will be a little cloudy.

How to debunk COVID-19 conspiracy theories

20 Mar 2020
Justine Calma, The Verge

In the whirlwind of news about the novel coronavirus pandemic, it can be hard to figure out what’s a scam or rumor and what’s vital information. The ways in which the COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, has transformed the way we work and keep ourselves entertained already feels unreal.

To understand why there’s so much misinformation out there — for example, that the virus was purposely created in a lab — The Verge spoke with John Cook, a cognitive science researcher at George Mason University and one of the authors of a new Conspiracy Theory Handbook. A big fan of acronyms, Cook came up with a handy one to recognize when you or someone you know might be headed down a conspiracy theory rabbit hole and how to “inoculate” ourselves and others against it.

Trump’s message on coronavirus and climate in parallel

6 Mar 2020
Scott Waldman, E&E News

But if Trump is trying to run the climate denial playbook against a looming public health threat, where risk is minimized and feelings replace science, it won’t work, argued John Cook, a cognitive scientist and climate communication researcher at George Mason University.

“It’s all the same techniques that we see in climate denial, and science denial in general, downplaying the severity of the problem; contradicting experts; and just relying on circumstantial, anecdotal evidence rather than actual scientific evidence,” said Cook, who has spent years researching climate disinformation.

“Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change”: Advice from GMU’’s Center for Climate Communication

5 Mar 2020
Adam Siegel, Get Energy Smart! NOW!

A key takeaway is the necessity to speak about climate change. A large majority of Americans recognize and are concerned about climate change. Due to the noise that Cranky Uncle climate denialists make and ‘climate silence’ (in the media, by political elite, by ‘us’), too many don’t recognize this and, in many cases, even those who are deeply concerned about climate change are too often silent (whether in social circles, work, or engaging with politicians). Ending that climate silence is, in itself, a virtuous cycle path to fostering greater public understanding of climate issues and support for action to address the climate crisis.

Book Review: ‘Cranky Uncle vs. Climate Change: How to Understand and Respond to Climate Science Deniers’ by John Cook

23 Feb 2020
San Francisco Review of Books

He uses the vehicle of a cranky uncle, a bald, mustachioed grump who has a negative answer for anything. The kind of guy who makes you hate going to Thanksgiving dinner, ever again. Every page has a delightfully different layout incorporating text in different places and shapes, cartoons, and callouts, in text and in cartoons. The result is an easy and even fun read, racking up points at every turn. It is bright and cheery, in steep contrast to the subject matter. That alone makes it a worthy entry on the climate shelf.

A Quarter Of All Climate Tweets Come From Bots — And They’re More Likely To Peddle Denial

22 Feb 2020
Yessenia Funes, Gizmodo

“One of the most dangerous elements of misinformation is its ability to cancel out accurate information,” John Cook, a researcher at the Centre for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University who was not involved in the study, wrote in an email to Earther. “When people are exposed to both facts and myths, if they have no way of resolving the conflict between the two, then they disengage and the two cancel each other out. This is what makes misinformation from bots so dangerous. Misinforming tweets don’t need to be especially convincing or successfully persuade people—its mere existence is all that’s needed to reduce the effectiveness of accurate information.”

TheESP – Ep. #210 – Cranky Uncle vs Climate Change with John Cook

20 Feb 2020
European Skeptics Podcast

On this episode we interview Australian cognitive scientist and founder of the Skeptical Sciencewebsite John Cook about his upcoming book ‘Cranky Uncle vs Climate Change’ that showcases typical climate science denial situations in a cartoon format. We also talk about other projects John has been busy with, including the Cranky Uncle app, The Debunking Handbook and a lot more.

The Art Of Debating Climate Change Deniers w/ John Cook, Founder of SkepticalScience.com

17 Feb 2020
Dragos Stefanescu, You’ve Been Warmed podcast

John Cook of SkepticalScience.com joins the pod to discuss how he developed his framework for debating climate change deniers, how to expose their arguments, how you can use humor as a tool for science communication and how all of this comes together in his new book and mobile app – ‘Cranky Uncle vs Climate Change’.

How to Sell Climate Action to Your Rural Conservative Neighbors

14 Feb 2020
Michael Barnard

Cook is also a cartoonist. His Cranky Uncle series, which is being extended this month both as a book and a game, helps illustrate key points of climate communication. The spiral of silence is one of them. Often, people want to talk about climate change, but they choose not to introduce the subject—thinking internally that they are the only ones concerned. The problem is that the vast majority of people are concerned. The Monmouth polling found that 71% of Americans view climate change as a very serious or somewhat serious problem. So most people want to talk about it, but fear of conflict or being the only one who cares is stopping them from speaking up.

In hottest decade on record, climate change appears nowhere in State of the Union address

5 Feb 2020
Elizabeth Weise, USA Today

John Cook, a climate communication researcher at George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, said Trump displayed a lack of leadership. “To tout planting trees as a solution to climate change without any mention of reducing emissions is like feeding poison to a child and when they get a headache, continuing to poison them while giving them an aspirin,” he said.

‘Cranky Uncle’ smart phone game will show you how to disarm climate deniers

14 Jan 2020
Bud Ward, Yale Climate Communications

And now your unique climate change version of Cranky Uncle will soon be yours for the asking for your delight and edification. This version will be unlike other flavors you’ve personally endured: This is a case in which folks wanting to better understand and teach about climate change are more likely to seek out the Cranky Uncle than to have to endure repeated visits from him.

Cranky Uncle Vs. Climate Change: John Cook Is A Cognitive Scientist, Climate Communicator, & Cartoonist

13 Jan 2020
Michael Barnard, Clean Technica

His book is coming out February 25th, 2020, so get your pre-orders of e-book and physical copies in now. I think it’s so good that I’m recommending that people buy it for others, as a leave-behind for people trying to move the needle on climate change. Buy one for your parents’ and grandparents’ homes, for your state representatives, for your congressman, and for the office. If you’re a politician, as is an Oregon state representative I was providing guidance to recently on how to communicate with her rural constituents on the subject, buy copies to leave behind with influential people in your district.

‘Cranky Uncle’ game offers a vaccination against climate disinformation

5 Dec 2019
Laurie Goering, Reuters

But an ally is at hand: ‘Cranky Uncle’, a gruff cartoon character and denier of climate change facts who, in a new game, helps you master the art of creating global warming disinformation – and makes you better at identifying it in the real world.

From the use of fake experts to cherry-picking data, “you learn the techniques and then you’re able to spot them yourself,” said John Cook, an assistant professor at Virginia’s George Mason University and one of the creators of the online game.

In one scenario, for instance, Cranky Uncle is falling, unconcerned, from a tall building while a white-coat-clad scientist leans out a window, warning he’ll hit the ground in 12 to 15 seconds.

Cranky Uncle: The smartphone game designed to fight climate denial

4 Dec 2019
Bulletin of Atomic Scientists

The overall idea here is to engage students, using narrative, character, humor, and interactive gameplay to explain the techniques of denial and sophistry—the use of reasoning or argument that sounds correct at first glance but is actually false—and consequently build resilience against misinformation. The game draws upon a decade of my research into the psychology of misinformation, including experiments into inoculation and the developing of critical thinking that deconstructs climate misinformation.

John Cook on misinformation and overcoming climate silence

4 Sep 2019
Cool It Podcast

On the premier of Not Cool, Ariel is joined by John Cook: psychologist, climate change communication researcher, and founder of SkepticalScience.com. Much of John’s work focuses on misinformation related to climate change, how it’s propagated, and how to counter it. He offers a historical analysis of climate denial and the motivations behind it, and he debunks some of its most persistent myths. John also discusses his own research on perceived social consensus, the phenomenon he’s termed “climate silence,” and more.