Why it's so hard to convince a climate denier

[Bill USA]

20. GG; I'm afraid I couldn't disagree more with your statement: "As far as I can tell, most scientists

and eco-activists are Intuitive or N types"

First of all I take issue with the proposition that people are either 'Sensing' 'types' or, 'Intuitive' 'types'. I would say to assert that people have to fall entirely into one category or the other is patently unacceptable. MOst people are combinations of these two "types". And I put the word 'types' in quotes as categorizing people in terms of 'types' is clearly too simplistic an approach for understanding human behavior.   People are far too complex to allow such a simplification to be of much use.

NOw, when you are talking about scientists, engaged in the use of the scientific method, while it is true when formulating an hypothesis some considerable imagination is involved in coming up with a postulated phenomenon or relationship and proposing a way to test the hypothesis offered. But scientists are entirely dedicated to empirical validation of proposed theories. From the scientific viewpoint, if you do not have highly disciplined or controlled methods of observing and consistent measuring of the processes or events observed - you cannot have scientific progress.

Those who are involved solely in abstractions are philosophers.

Science would never have gotten anywhere without observation of natural phenomena as the basis of development of theories explaining the observed phenomena.

Now, it is true that theoretical physicists and mathematicians have predicted things before they were ever observed (e.g. Black holes) but scientists, to a man (or woman), would insist that scientific knowledge and understanding is based on observation and measurement of events occurring in nature. When the theoretical types have predicted certain phenomena they were offering interesting hypotheses or extrapolations of known relationships - but until these hypotheses were confirmed with observations of real events, they remained interesting hypotheses only. They cannot become theories until observations of the real events confirms the hypotheses. And beyond that the theories do not become scientific facts until they are tested and confirmed a number of times by other researchers.

Also of course, one should not throw scientists in with "eco-activists", whatever the term 'eco-activists' includes. Most writers on scientific topics are well versed in the importance of the careful gathering data to support or test a hypothesis, before declaring a hypothesis a theory and only after much testing by other researchers can a theory be declared confirmed and then elevated to scientific fact or natural law. But then, there are many people writing articles on technical or scientific matters but there is no guarantee that any one of them is actually interested in using science to confirm their particular beliefs or theories. There are shills and well meaning environmental 'activists' who make breath-taking assertions without the benefit of solid empirical evidence - or even in the face of evidence which contradicts their assertions.