Evaluating Scholarly Articles on Climate Change on a Free Essay

Gillis, Justin. "Naomi Oreskes, A Lightning Rod In A Changing Climate". The New York Times 2015. Web. 17 May 2016.

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This article is based on Dr. Oreske's interest in the finding of why there existed people who denied that climate change exists. With research into the different articles and works of different authors on climate change, she manages to unearth the denial behind the existence of climate change. It s evident that the publishing of facts about climate change is politically challenged by those that denial that climate change is an issue that needs to be solved. The author further highlights that the scientists who attack environmental research had been doing this for long. They were in denial and most probably funded by industries that wanted to continue flourishing in their businesses. It is well noted that they were even in denial of the existence of acid rain, the science of the ozone layer and the fact that secondhand smoking of tobacco as being harmful. The denial of mitigating climate change is one aspect that has been proved to be wrong by this scientist and an estimated 97% of the other scientists on environmental issues especially those interested in the climate. Therefore, they have a reason to support why some people or groups attack those that lobby for the solving of global warming. The reason is based on the selfish gains of seeking for profits by some companies and this shows that human beings are majorly behind the global warming.

Evaluation and Reflection

Evaluation Criteria Article

Currency: When was the study published? Is it current enough for your purpose? Published on: The article was published on June 15th 2015. This means that it is current in regards to the research question of this paper because it is only a less than 5 years old.

Research format

Was there an introduction that gave a review of the literature (past research done on this or similar topics)?

What is the purpose of this study? What were the researchers trying to find out? In other words, what was the hypothesis?

What were the procedures? What did they do to gather data?

Who was the sample population or the focus population? Did the population represent the general public or did you find there was a bias? Was the population too small?

What were the results? Did the results support the hypothesis?

Did the researchers mention caveats or weaknesses in this study? Did they discuss what direction future research should go in?

Were there sections with clear titles and graphs, charts and/or statistics to support findings?

In the research paper, the article provides a background of some research papers that had been done the failure of mitigating global warming. Work as that of Erick Conway on the dubious means used to dispute the findings of acid rain were relevantly reviewed in this article.

The purpose of this study was based on finding out whether climate change is caused by human beings or not. With this elaborated, the research question about the denial of existence of global warming with the aim of avoiding its mitigation would be discussed. It is true that human beings are in denial and do not want to mitigate climate change because they are the major contributors to global warming?

The author of this article gathered data from the archives and the works of Dr Oreskes. The works involved the archives that the scientist had explored. The sample of the population in this case was the archives 928 published scientific papers. This represented the whole population of the scientists opinions and findings. The results indicated that those in denial of the existence and the propagation of climate change by human beings were wrong. 975 of the scientists agreed that human beings were the major causes of global warming. The article did not mention the weakness of the research and had no charts or graphs

Authority:

Who wrote the article? What are his/her credentials?

Who published the article?

The author of the article is Justin Gillis. Gillis is a journalist and a blogger who gathers information about scientists and publishes them. The publisher of the article is The New York Times Newspaper

Accuracy:

Is the information supported by evidence/references? What kinds? Was there a clear bibliography?

The information is supported by references from the books of Dr. Oreskes and a documentary that highlights the falsehoods of those that deny the existence of global warming. The references were not in a list or there was no bibliography

Based on this worksheet, do you think this source is useful to your purposes and a reliable research study? Why or why not?

Based on the worksheet, the source is resourceful for a research study because, it has samples and presents more works that can be explored to support the topic

Boyce, Joel. "Climate Denier Teaches University Climate Science Course". (2012): n. pag. Print.

The article is based on the denial about climate change that some people that are advocating for. The author presents a number of reservations about the unethical practice that Tom Harris a professor teaches students. He lobbies against the mitigation of climate change. As the author outlines, there is a high possibility that he does this due to the funding and the secret financial funding that he receives from sources that do not support the mitigation of climate change. The author insists that Harris is one of the obstacles towards the solving of climate change issues. Boyce is concerned about the introduction of a course that is factual errors about climate change. This is has done a lot of damage because intellects that are supposed to support the climate change are on the denial side.

Assessment and Reflecion

Evaluation Criteria Article

Currency: When was the article published? Is it current enough for your purpose? Published on: The article was published on February 28th 2012. Therefore, it is up to date since I needed articles that are less than five years old.

Relevance:

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your research question?

Is the information at an appropriate level (not too basic and not too advanced for your needs)? The article is relevant to my research question it tackles the areas of how people are not ready to face the problem of climate change and mitigate it. The information presented indicates that the Instructor, Tom Harris was in denial of the need to accept that climate change exists and avert it. Therefore, as an instructor, he goes ahead to teach students that do not major in Sciences courses about the non-existence of climate change. In his teaching, Harris is seen as a lobbyist who does not believe that climate change is really. Therefore, he gathers techniques of having followers in order to avoid mitigating climate change. His information throughout this article indicates the manner in which he views denies that climate change facts are really. The information provided in this articles is at an appropriate level

Authority:

Who wrote the article? What are his/her credentials?

Who published the article? This article was written by Dr. Joel Boyce who is an Adjunct Professor at Concordia University Portland. He currently teaches in the School of Education about Current Issues in Literacy. The publishers of the article are The Committee for Scientific Skepticism.

Accuracy:

Is the information supported by evidence/references? What kinds? The denial of climate change that Tom Harris lobbies against is fully supported by the comments from his students and his publications. He also accepts but he terms it as academic freedom. The quotes in this article are derived majorly from the website that is managed by Tom Harris, Rate My professor.

Purpose:

Based on this worksheet, do you think this source is useful to your purposes and reliable? Why or why not? Based on the information presented in this worksheet, the source is credible as a non scholarly article for the purpose of answering the question of people failing to accept to handle the mitigation of climate change. The information is valid because it is a discovery that was made and has been proved through credible sources.

Works Cited

Boyce, Joel. "Climate Denier Teaches University Climate Science Course". (2012): n. pag. Print.

Gillis, Justin. "Naomi Oreskes, A Lightning Rod In A Changing Climate". The New York Times 2015. Web. 17 May 2016.