Think tanks deliberately manufacture public doubt about settled science to shape policy

Evidence

The scientific debate remains open. Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming. Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly. Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debates. — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 626

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Oreskes and Conway’s ‘Merchants of Doubt’ on the tobacco/climate denial playbook. — connects to: Climate-denial think tanks manufactured the invented ‘climate lockdowns’ threat — Naomi Klein, Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror…, 486; Energy-funded conservative think tanks spearhead climate science attacks — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm…, 2538; Climate denial trades on manufactured doubt, not persuasion of scientists — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 927 (+16 more)
• SEED: An essay angle: the explicit strategic memo logic of agnotology — how manufactured uncertainty is presented as a scientific ‘debate’ in public discourse.

Broader Connections

• Climate-denial think tanks manufactured the invented ‘climate lockdowns’ threat #exemplifies (0.95) — Naomi Klein, Doppelganger, 486
• Energy-funded conservative think tanks spearhead climate science attacks #exemplifies (0.92) — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 2538
• Climate denial trades on manufactured doubt, not persuasion of scientists #corroborates (0.90) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 927
• Casting doubt on settled evidence is a standard tactic to delay regulation #corroborates (0.88)
• The tobacco industry’s PR strategy manufactured doubt about EPA science #exemplifies (0.85) — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1670
• The tobacco industry manufactured public doubt as its primary defense strategy #exemplifies (0.85) — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1658
• Tobacco’s manufactured doubt predated and enabled climate denial playbooks #expands (0.85) — Jamal Awil, The Whispering Archive, 788
• Google funds think tanks to shape policy narratives in its favor #exemplifies (0.75) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 401
• Think tanks arose to replace critical scholars with imperial-friendly policy theory #expands (0.75)
• Modernity institutionalises doubt, making all knowledge claims inherently circular #expands (0.72) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 408