This is something most of us suspected anyways -- now a rigidly scientific survey has basically proven it:
That self-proclaimed experts, aka 'Climate Change Deniers' (as a result of human activities) -- receive far too much time in media, given their actually proportion of the population, known as peer-reviewed Scientists.
The survey went through great pains to find a "representative population" to sample from; the "sample size" responding to the survey (1868 scientists) -- makes the study's conclusions 'rock solid':
Climate Contrarians Overrepresented in Media Coverage, New Survey Finds
Scientific survey finds media may be skewing its coverage of climate science by seeking out views of a small minority who questions man-made warming.
by John H. Cushman Jr., InsideClimate News, insideclimatenews.org -- Aug 11, 2014
There is an overwhelming consensus among expert scientists studying climate change that man-made pollution is the main cause of global warming. But the media may be skewing its coverage of the issue by persistently seeking out the views of a contrarian minority, according to a new study.
In an opinion survey of nearly 1,900 scientists, 90 percent of the respondents with more than 10 peer-reviewed articles to their name "explicitly agreed with anthropogenic greenhouse gases being the dominant driver of recent global warming," the study found.
[...]
"Those who most strongly disagree with the discernible influence of anthropogenic GHGs [greenhouse gases] on climate are overrepresented in the media," the authors wrote.
Here is the Question that set off the authors 'detectors' regarding the Media's misconstruing of this "debatable issue" -- in a "fair and balanced"
both-sides-are right way:
Q3. How would you characterize the contribution of the following factors to the reported global warming of ∼0.8 °C since preindustrial times: GHGs, aerosols, land use, sun, internal variability, spurious warming?
Qualitative answer options ranged from “strong cooling” to “strong warming”. “Spurious warming” refers to global mean surface temperature change being overestimated due to artifacts in the data, such as Urban Heat Island (UHI) effects.
Q3b. How would you describe the level of scientific understanding for each of these factors?
Answer options ranged from very low to high.
For the vast majority of seriously peer-reviewed Scientists --
there is no debate.
Here's a few snapshots from the Report that finds, 'Climate Deniers get far too much Air Time' -- to give you some idea of its scope and seriousness.
[emphasis has been added.]
Scientists’ Views about Attribution of Global Warming
Bart Verheggen, Bart Strengers, John Cook, Rob van Dorland, Kees Vringer, Jeroen Peters, Hans Visser, and Leo Meyer
The general public is strongly divided over the question of human causation of climate change.[1] Many believe that climate scientists are equally divided with respect to the same question, in contrast to what several studies[2−5] have found. Perceptions about the level of agreement or disagreement among scientists influence people’s acceptance of scientific conclusions and their support for related policies.[6,7] Public perception of climate change and of the scientific consensus on the subject, in turn, is influenced by ethical, social, and political values and attitudes.[8,9]
Scientists are considered a trusted source of climate information;[10] hence, public commenters frequently use the purported existence of either strong agreement or strong disagreement as an argument pro or contra the validity of assessments by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Leviston and Walker[11] showed that the general public has a tendency to overestimate the prevalence of contrarian opinions in climate science and to underestimate the level of agreement.
[...]
ABSTRACT: Results are presented from a survey held among 1868 scientists studying various aspects of climate change, including physical climate, climate impacts, and mitigation. The survey was unique in its size, broadness and level of detail. Consistent with other research, we found that, as the level of expertise in climate science grew, so too did the level of agreement on anthropogenic causation. 90% of respondents with more than 10 climate-related peer-reviewed publications (about half of all respondents), explicitly agreed with anthropogenic greenhouse gases (GHGs) being the dominant driver of recent global warming. [...]
That last sentence cited from the Abstract, looks like this in chart form -- with the various lines, being
a proxy for the respondent's professional expertize (their number of peer-reviewed papers in the Climate field):
This graph is one of many that Authors compiled from their Survey Results.
It basically says the more credible you are as a Climate Scientist, the more likely you are to agree that humans are causing Climate Change and that it is a serious problem.
Media Programming Directors should take note -- and stop treating "both sides of this issue as being equal."
Because it has NOW been "scientific proven" that they are NOT equal. One side of the climate discussion is far more prevalent and accepted than the other, to very very significant degree ...
Think about the "debate" between The Flat Earth Society vs NASA Scientists sending spacecraft into orbit and beyond, and you might start to get sense of the lop-sided nature of this of this "fair and balanced Debate" -- otherwise known as human-caused Climate Change ... happening as we speak (... as we continue to dismiss it, following our Media's uninformed lead).