Explores the contrast between Allied and Core belief in the culture of climate catastrophe, and the relationships of these plus religiosity to Climate Change Activism (XR and Children’s Strikes for Climate).
Introduction
The opening post of this series demonstrated a strong correlation across nations between religiosity, and the responses per nation to unconstrained questions from a 2019 YouGov survey on attitudes to climate-change, which questions are aligned to Catastrophic Climate Change Culture (CCCC). Chart 1 below was shown towards the end of the prior post. Y axis values show the percentage of ‘a great deal’ responses to two climate survey questions: “How much of an impact, if any, do you believe climate change will have on your life?” (blue series), and “how much power, if any, do you think each of the following have to combat climate change?” sub-option, “International bodies (e.g. the United Nations)” (pink series).
I term the effect causing these trends ‘Allied Belief’ (ABel). They occur because the surface alliance between CCCC and religion, makes religious adherents feel comfortable with climate catastrophe narratives, as long as there are no reality constraints, thereby disabling their Innate Skepticism of CCCC. As religiosity rises within nations (going left to right), ISk about CCCC narratives falls, and so belief in said narratives rises. The pink series is muted, as it’s only needed to show lower gradient for less emotive / existential / personal questions. Note: ISk is an instinctive mechanism that is very different to rational skepticism. [Chart is simplified Chart 2 in SI datafile].