This week in science: tangled webs

Probability of giving the correct answer on a question about climate change in relation to individuals' political ideology and science "intelligence." -Dan Kahan.

Probability of giving the correct answer on a question about climate change in relation to individuals' political ideology and science "intelligence." -Dan Kahan.

A researcher has looked into partisan science denial and guess what? Turns out conservatives often know the right answer, they just don't like it:

Using this survey tool, he is able to present evidence showing that (1) as people get better at science, they are more likely in general to affirm that global warming is mostly due to human activities; but (2) as soon as you split people up in to liberals and conservatives, that conclusion goes out the window. Actually, liberals get way better in their answers as their science ability increases, and conservatives get considerably worse:

It would be fascinating to see results on some anti-vaccination beliefs versus facts.

• What happened the last time Greenland melted?
• A diamond the size of Earth!
• Women vs. Science
• Here's a tech note: after downloading AOL—to check in with some old friends—my entire system was spewing ads at me from every angle and margin, every landing page getting slammed to spam, even copying and pasting was a challenge. It took hours to return my PC to usability and it's not all there, yet. Thus, a bare-bones post this week in science.