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All IPCC definitions taken from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Annex I, Glossary, pp. 941-954. Cambridge University Press.

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Talks and Presentations

List of talks

Talks prior to 2022 are available on this page.

6 November 2024: CCRUN webinar about climate change misinformation and disinformation

The webinar's topic focused on climate change misinformation and disinformation and included three speakers: Dr. Gavin Schmidt, Dr. John Cook, and Dr. Emily Vraga who each gave a presentation on this critical topic. All presentations are available in this blog post. John Cook was the 2nd speaker during the webinar and he talked about detecting misleading climate misinformation. John's presentation is available as a PDF here.

10 October 2024: SciFuture interview with John Cook

John Cook discusses the dynamics of misinformation and his teams use of AI to help automatically detect and counter it.

24 July 2024: Center for Climate Safety podcast about pushing back against climate misinformation

John Cook was the guest on the The Sustainable Hour podcast no. 513 and talked about pushing back against climate misinformation and climate science.

23 July 2024: Sierra Club Canada podcast - Climate Misinformation Mechanics, Cranky Uncle, and Skeptical Science with John Cook

John talked with "The Environment in Canada" podcast about real experiences of using his resources in practical climate communications work (and the results).

18 June 2024: SciFuture - AI & the Holy Grail of Fact Checking

John Cook discussed the usefulness of AI in fact checking. Misinformation researchers refer to automatic detection and debunking of misinformation as the “holy-grail of fact-checking”. Machine learning models have achieved high accuracy in detecting contrarian claims about climate change, as well as detecting logical fallacies in climate misinformation. However, there is a significant gap between misinformation detection and automatic generation of corrections that are both accurate and effective. Debunkings should adhere to the best-practice recommendations informed by psychological research, such as the fact-myth-fallacy-fact structure (aka the “truth sandwich”). In this presentation, Dr. John Cook outlined how he combined machine learning research on fallacy and contrarian claim detection with generative AI to develop a model that automatically debunks climate misinformation using “truth sandwich” corrections.

1 January 2024: A conversation between Melanie Trecek-King and John Cook about a Scientific Consensus

There are so many misconceptions about consensus in science: What is a consensus? Does science work via consensus? Melanie Trecek-King asked these questions and more in this interview with John Cook, the main author of the 97% consensus on climate change study!

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15 December 2023: A conversation between Melanie Trecek-King and John Cook about Cranky Uncle

Melanie Trecek-King - who runs the "Thinking is Power" website - talked with John Cook about the Cranky Uncle game. They discussed both the classic and the vaccine version of the interactive game explaining the techniques and tricks used in science denial.

16 November 2023: CMCC - Foresight Dialogues 2023. Our planet, climate and society

John Cook was one of the panelists discussing climate change communication and the information landscape on November 16 at the “Foresight Dialogues”, an initiative by the CMCC Foundation – Euro-Mediterranean Center on Climate Change. The video starts in Italian but the panel discussion - starting at 4m40s - was held in English.

28 June 2023: International conference on Climate Justice - Skeptical Science: Giving facts a fighting chance against misinformation

Bärbel Winkler was invited to the International confernence on Climate Justice to talk about Skeptical Science and the resources we offer to give facts a fighting chance against misinformation.

19 May 2023: PEPSS seminar 2023 #4: Countering Science Misinformation - A case study of the Great Barrier Reef

As part of the University of Queensland's PEPSS seminar series a panel discussion on countering science misinformation looking at the Great Barrier Reef as a case study was recorded Friday May 19th, 2023. Speakers were Dr Alicia Kennedy, A/Manager Reef Programs in the Office of the Great Barrier Reef within the Queensland Government Department of Environment and Science, and Dr John Cook, Senior Research Fellow with the Melbourne Centre for Behaviour Change at the University of Melbourne. John's presentation starts at 18m35s in.

28 April 2023: Columbia Public Health - Turning the Tide: Combatting Misinformation in Public Health

John Cook was invited to speak at a full-day conference on combatting health misinformation at
Columbia University about how inoculation theory informs the Cranky Uncle game. His talk starts at timestamp 2:32:00 within the 6 1/2 hours long recording of the event.

24 February 2023: Fighting Disinformation Roadmap eSummit (Bärbel Winkler)

This video is a recording created in preparation for Bärbel's 7 minute presentation at the eSummit "Fighting Disinformation Roadmap" organgized by Reclaim the Facts.

17 November 2022: Climate Services in Canada's North: Are We Doing Enough?

Robert Way was invited to give a presentation for the Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society (CMOS). Building on over a decade of research in Canada’s North, Dr. Way offers commentary on the real world challenges for researchers and communities introduced by inadequate climate and weather monitoring infrastructure across the North. Providing insights and perspectives ranging from working with Arctic climate datasets to installing remote weather stations in Labrador Inuit communities, this talk will explore the gaps and potential opportunities for observing and preparing for changes in northern Canada’s climate.

16 July 2022: CCL Training - Trees and Forests as Natural Climate Solutions

Dana Nuccitelli offered a training for members of Citizens' Climate Lobby (CCL) about the need for approaches to remove and sequester carbon from the atmosphere, the role trees and forests can play, and the other benefits that those solutions provide.

28 June 2022: Fighting Misinformation Online - Google News Initiative

John Cook was invited by Google to speak about online misinformation in Prague (starting at 1h57m)

7 May 2022: Cambridge Skeptics

John Cook talked with the Cambridge Skeptics about using critical thinking to build resilience against misinformation.

22 April 2022: CCL Training - IPCC Sixth Assessment Report Updates

Dana Nuccitelli did a training for members of the Cititzens' Climate Lobby (CCL), discussing all three volumes of the new Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report.

24 February 2022: University of Washington Program on the environment

John Cook gave a lecture to UW students about "Climate Communication: Building Resiliency to Misinformation".

10 February 2022: National Capital Area Skeptics (NCAS)

John Cook talked with Scott Snell, President of the National Capital Area Skeptics, about "Protecting the Public from Misinformation: Inoculating with a Weakened Form of Misinformation".

26 January 2022: Mallen Baker Show

John Cook talked with Mallen Baker about "The dilemmas of debunking climate disinformation."

Talks prior to 2022 are available on this page.

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