Minor Assignment 94/1/2018 In “Discourse Coalitions, Science Blogs, and the Global Debate Over Climate Change,” Graham Smart attempts to make sense out of the mess that is the debate over climate change. He does this by looking into the three different discourse coalitions that are most prevalent in this topic: Advocates, Skeptics, and Eco-Optimists. To give some quick background information, advocates are those that believe climate change is happening and is caused by human generated green house gases, skeptics are those that do not believe climate change is occurring, and eco-optimists are those that accept global warming is occurring, but it is a natural occurrence that will correct itself with time. With these three groups in mind, Smart begins to look at how the communicate their ideas, and how they interact with one another. He eventually introduces the idea of science blogs, and how they are used by the different groups. He demonstrates how blogs are often used as a medium where people with different ideas can argue with each other. A practice that, while reminiscent of the Greek forums where people could express their thoughts and disagreements, felt more petty than beneficial, and Smart comes to a very similar conclusion.
He concludes his thoughts by saying “the study shows that although each of the three discourse coalitions offer its pubic version of climate-science knowledge, these versions are incommensurate, with the consequence that individuals are denied the possibility of developing, through dialogue, greater scientific understanding” (174). Essentially, he’s arguing that by the different discourse coalitions focusing more on the debate than presenting facts, the public loses the ability to form opinions of their own. Especially when it comes to a topic like climate change that affects all of us, it is a shame when scientists are more focused on being right than helping the public generate informed opinions. While Smart’s work was an interesting look into how different groups of people interact, and how this affects the public, I do not believe that it is too relevant to my final project. I have come to this conclusion because I am not writing about anything too “fact based” that could be refuted by another individual. My final project focuses more on why a person should visit a certain preserve, not presenting them with a bunch of facts that they must accept as true or false.
2 Comments
Tory Stoddard
4/1/2018 05:15:05 pm
I like how in your last paragraph you discussed why your project would not be relevant to the author's findings. Typically people just agree with the writer but it makes sense why yours is not an argument based matter. Good work.
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Collin Barker
4/8/2018 08:53:29 pm
Jacob, You did an excellent job summarizing Graham Smart's work and key points. I could see where you incorporated some of what we have learned this semester about the value of rhetorical and metaphorical language in your opening statement, "attempts to make sense out of the mess that is the debate over climate change" which made me want to learn more. I think that you also included a very thoughtful argument against using his work in applying it to your project.
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April 2018
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The purpose of these blogs were to serve as a mode to turn in minor assignments for my Professional Writing Class. Many are responses to reading we did, and a couple are first drafts of various major assignments. |