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SUMMARY:Climate Change and Conspiracy Theory - Prof. David Runciman\, POLI
 S &amp\; Trinity Hall
DTSTART:20140520T164500Z
DTEND:20140520T181500Z
UID:TALK44504@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Prof Jane Chapman
DESCRIPTION:Arguments about climate change are rife with conspiracy theori
 es. There are those who think the whole thing is a giant hoax: a scam cook
 ed up by environmentalists and left-wing scientists to empower governments
  and rip off consumers. But there are equivalent suspicions on the other s
 ide: a belief that the sceptics and denialists are just the front for an o
 il industry-funded plot to bamboozle voters and keep the fossil fuels flow
 ing. The prevalence of these kinds of conspiracy theories is one reason wh
 y the debate has become so fractious and polarised. This talk will explore
  why the climate debate seems so susceptible to conspiracy theories and wh
 at that tells us about the current state of mistrust in democracy: mistrus
 t of experts\, mistrusts of corporations\, mistrust of government itself. 
 Why on an issue like this - of such enormous importance - do we find it so
  hard to believe what we are told?\n\nThis talk comes out of the work of t
 he Leverhulme-funded project on Conspiracy and Democracy based in CRASSH\,
  of which David Runciman is one of the principal investigators along with 
 Professor Richard Evans and Professor John Naughton.
LOCATION:Gatsby Room\, Wolfson College
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