Talk:Climate change in the United States

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Rename[edit]

I would propose that the article be named "Effects of climate change in the United States". Climate change, as we can (hopefully) all agree is a global thing. What the article actually goes into detail on is the effects of climate change as it relates to the United States such as the recent heat wave. There is a small blurb about the causes in the United States which would fit the title perfectly, but over 80% of the rest of the page is just effects of climate change in the United States and Greenhouse gas emissions in the United States is already a page of its own.

Side note, the reason I am not WP:BOLDing this and making an RMA is because I know that Climate Change topics in general provoke a lot of criticism and accusations of malintent so I wanted to pitch it here first to see if there is general consensus on this before moving forward. Jcmcc (Talk) 02:35, 4 July 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • I oppose this rename because:

1) All the other country articles (including at least one rated "good") are named "Climate change in countryname"

2) This article is about changes in the Climate of the United States Chidgk1 (talk) 17:50, 20 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]

  • Strong oppose. The table of contents conclusively demonstrates that the article is in no way limited to "effects". Much of the article is about the changing U.S. climate itself, with various related sub-topics. —RCraig09 (talk) 04:58, 21 August 2021 (UTC)[reply]
    I would have to agree. Limiting it to effects discredits sections such as economic and public effects as well as, the impact on people. Minnesota!2022 (talk) 12:58, 31 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    I agree to the opposition on the name change. "Climate Change in the United States" is succinct and leaves space for the sections on policy and culture. Collegestudent6 (talk) 00:17, 1 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Impacts on Indigenous people, Part II[edit]

It seems that another viewpoint could be helpful in this discussion. I think you both have valid points. Some of the sources (eg, this) removed by RCraig09 don't have anything to do with climate change (meaning that searching for the term 'climate' gets no hits). Some of the sources do have to do with climate change (eg, Zoe Todd and Heather Davis), and these should be included. I'm going to replace some of the sources that represent valid perspectives removed by RCraig09 and that are reliable sources (peer reviewed journals). Hopefully this will also resolve some of Hobomok's concerns. Larataguera (talk) 17:21, 18 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Larataguera: Thank you. Be aware that reliable sourcing and neutral point of view aren't the only issues; remember basic relevance. Critically, this section is about the impacts (effects) of climate change as understood by science; see my text following the four charts inserted above. The causes of climate change are a completely different issue—even if Hobomok and activists try to link them for political reasons. 17:46, 18 Dec . . . Of course it's fine to quote Whyte etc in context about the impacts, as you have done in your first edit a few minutes ago. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:51, 18 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think one thing that we should all be aware of is that there is a tendency to reduce 'climate change' to 'global climate change caused by burning hydrocarbons'. Actually, climate in the US has been changed by other factors such as deforestation, desertification, major infrastructure such as dams, etc for much longer than GHG emissions have been changing global climate. So, while global climate change wasn't instrumental in the experience of American Indigenous people until relatively recently, Indigenous people have experienced climate change in the United States for quite some time, and that is the topic of this article. So we can't reduce the American Indigenous experience of climate change in the United States to GHG emissions. I think this observation may be at the core of some of the confusion/conflict between RCraig09 and Hobomok . . . Larataguera (talk)
Importantly, it's extremely misleading to say that "Climate change in the United States" implies this expansive definition of "climate change". The term "climate change", as used in the overwhelming majority of reliable sources and on Wikipedia has meant global warming-induced climate change—not just a decontextualized definition like "any change in the climate". See the Climate change and Climate variability and change articles themselves, which to my knowledge have never hinted about locally-induced changes to local "climate". Such a vague definition confuses readers about the global crisis. P.S. deforestation increases greenhouse gases as a global phenomenon, and desertification is a result of climate change, and dams substantially affect ~only local "climate". — 18:35, 18 Dec. . . "Climate change" is a term and not a descriptive phrase, and should not be decomposed to mean "any change in climate"—any more than "hot dog" should be expanded to mean "any dog that is hot". —RCraig09 (talk) 17:58, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
The disambiguation hatnote at the top of the Climate change article reflects the particular definitions that are used on Wikipedia articles. —RCraig09 (talk)
Yes, I agree it's potentially confusing. I think I've made the distinction clear though. Larataguera (talk) 04:49, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I think some of the content that was removed about Traditional ecological knowledge is relevant for this article, but probably shouldn't be under this section on 'impacts'. It might be included in a new sub-section under 'adaptation'. There are several relevant sources that discuss TEK in the context of climate change. I hope to add this later. Larataguera (talk) 05:08, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I agree that TEK has a place in adaptation, hopefully sourced to reports of specific scientifically demonstrated techniques and not merely to 'promotional' sources. Your edits to date wisely place the assertions in context of who the sources are, and that the content is how they view climate change's impacts. —RCraig09 (talk) 06:03, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I hadn't noticed your edit re "man camps"North Dakota involved in resource extraction (true even before climate change), and that are not a true impact of climate change that is the subject of this article, so I deleted that sentence. Whyte's content re increased outsider access because of melting iceArctic to resources doesn't have such problems. PS Your mention of "large predominately male workforces" comes across as sensationalistic and non-neutral editor commentary not directly connected to the "access" issue, and that "large..." language didn't seem to be in the Whyte reference. PPS After you "fully" cite a source once, if you need to use it again you can use an abbreviated citation with a "/" before the ">"... like <ref name="Smith"/> —RCraig09 (talk) 06:44, 19 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I replaced the sentence about man camps. The increased access for resource extraction is relevant to this section in the context of how it affects people. It's true that the MMIW crisis existed before climate change, but Whyte's whole point is that climate change intensifies existing crises. I have tried to be clearer about that in the replaced phrasing. I'm still hoping to get to the inclusion of TEK, (with good sources of course) but it might take a few days. Larataguera (talk) 17:13, 20 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Certainly, TEK is relevant. I hope you can find independent, reliable reference(s) that specifically describe particular scientifically demonstrated TEK approaches that can help to relieve greenhouse gas increase that causes climate change. Helping environmentally, by itself, is not enough.
Concerning the non-neutrally-named, provocatively-named 'man camps', my edit comment wasn't specific enough to explain that what Whyte said about ice melting applies only to the Arctic, is tenuously related to 'man camps' mentioned with respect to North Dakota, which he says "attract" sex trafficking. It's an indirect and speculative link from climate change to sex trafficking, but I've left it in the article because it's expressed in the context of Whyte's saying it. I made the language track what the reference actually states; we should all strive to be true to the references without introducing our own commentary or interpretations. —RCraig09 (talk) 19:02, 20 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Not sure I understand your objection to the term 'man camp'. This is what they are called in the industry or here. I understand your vigilance about NPOV, but I think you are quick to claim that I'm editorializing when I am using the terms in the sources that are widely accepted by all parties. I know you don't intend this, but your attempt to keep biased tone out of the article is actually introducing a bias—not uniformly so, but in this specific instance you are softening a widely accepted term that even the oil industry uses to describe its own operation. It is difficult to be aware of our own biases, but I will try if you will. Larataguera (talk) 21:14, 20 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
"Man camp" is not so widely used that I have ever heard of it in my entire life. More objectively, twenty years after Wikipedia's founding there is no Man camp Wikipedia article, and no entry in dictionary.com, in the same manner as labor camp or summer camp are in both. Recited with reference to sex trafficking, the non-neutral effect of using the term is clear. —RCraig09 (talk) 22:21, 20 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Man camps is a term that is widely used in the oil and gas industry (as larataguera (talk · contribs) has shown, (but here’s another example and another, and another), and in popular literature (some from sources already used on this page like High Country News and NYT) see here or here or here, and in scholarship outside of Whyte’s work/whyte’s field: example and example. I can provide many objective secondary popular and scholarly sources in relation to studies done around man camps and sex trafficking if you would like.
Just because someone has never heard of a word or because it doesn’t have a Wikipedia page doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist and it isn’t used widely.—Hobomok (talk) 02:49, 21 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I wasn't arguing the "Just because" phrase above. Mere "use", or asserted "wide use" with examples, are not enough. Undeniably the term is not neutral. Linking it with sex trafficking demonizes "men", especially those who work on oil projects. Whyte's ": Decolonizing..." reference itself places the term in quotes, which he would not likely have done were the term in fact known even to him. His quotes emphasize it, for reasons easy to surmise. Almost certainly, "man camp" is objectively misdescriptive since they're probably not 100% occupied by males (in this century, at least). Conversely, "laborers' camp" is a neutral descriptive term, not a loaded term, and thus does not "introduce bias". An encyclopedia shouldn't accept loaded "man camp" terminology over "laborers' camps" any more than we should refer to the value-laden Climate crisis characterization instead of the neutral and scientifically descriptive Climate change. —RCraig09 (talk) 03:04, 21 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
OK, well I originally chimed in here to help sort out a conflict, not to start another one. So I'm willing to leave this here for now. I hope to get around to the above mentioned TEK contributions later. Thanks. Larataguera (talk) 14:31, 21 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, @Larataguera:. —RCraig09 (talk) 15:16, 21 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@Larataguera: I've added a paragraph to the Adaptation section. I think it could use additional specific examples of adaptation. —RCraig09 (talk) 16:26, 22 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
@RCraig09:, thanks for starting on that. I'll add some more later. Probably be a week or so before I can get through everything else on my plate right now. Larataguera (talk) 21:12, 23 December 2021 (UTC)[reply]
I wanted to add onto this point made, the sources seem to be biased and the claims are not neutral. To state "Thus, the impacts of global climate change are viewed as being not separate from but rather an intensification of the impacts of settler colonialism." This claim is biased and also taken from the paper 'Indigenous Climate Change Studies: Indigenizing Futures, Decolonizing the Anthropocene' by Kyle Whyte stating that this a key theme. Not factual evidence. Salmaismail222 (talk) 01:23, 21 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I started to work on including more information about TEK as an adaptation to climate change, and began by reviewing the article on TEK, which has a section on climate change. That whole section included a very long list of climate change impacts to Indigenous people in the US. That is a global article, and while impacts of climate change are certainly relevant to TEK, I don't think a list of climate change impacts to American Indigenous people belongs in that article. So I started moving some of that information over here to the impacts section. More to do, but I'm done for now. Larataguera (talk) 18:07, 3 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that much of the commentary in the TEK article's "Climate change" section, had/has little to do with TEK as such, or, at best, takes a long time setting up how the impacts of climate change have necessitated new applications of TEK. When I researched TEK in a climate change context, practically everything I found related to adaptation, the results of which I put into the Adaptation section of the present article. On a general note, we should all be striving to present what references actually say—even literally to the extent that copyright allows—without introducing our own commentary and explanation; this is particularly true when it comes to predictions/forecasts and generalizations. —RCraig09 (talk) 22:31, 3 January 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: Introduction to Policy Analysis[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 28 March 2022 and 30 May 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Milkncooki (article contribs).

Incorrect Linkage[edit]

In the introduction paragraph, Paragraph 1 the word 'Climate Action' takes you to an incorrect link, leading you to the Climate change Mitigation wiki page. I have removed the incorrect link and tried linking it to the corresponding page but there are no links leading to 'Climate action'. Salmaismail222 (talk) 00:27, 21 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Under the section 'See also' there are multiple links corresponding to the correct page but when clicking on 'Hurricane Katrina and global warming' you are referred to a wiki page titled "Tropical cyclones and climate change". Salmaismail222 (talk) 01:03, 21 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

In the International cooperation section of the article there are some outdated and some missing sources. I would advise you add some new climate policies that are being incorporated internationally. Milkncooki (talk) 17:30, 23 April 2022 (UTC).[reply]

Underrepresented Viewpoint[edit]

Under "Climate change by state or territory, " more elaboration should be added. Understanding how climate change policies work in different states and territories is extremely crucial and significant to understanding the basis of Climate change in the United States. The viewpoint seems underrepresented within the article. Salmaismail222 (talk) 00:57, 21 April 2022 (UTC).[reply]

Under "Impacts on animals and wildlife" the section should have more emphasis on the impacts on animals and wildlife, adding more details and reliable sources that are more relevant; the sources are linked to 2015 and although it may seem somewhat relevant as Climate change continues to grow and shift there should be more relevant sources and analysis linked as the topic is underrepresented. Salmaismail222 (talk) 01:09, 21 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Under "Economic impact" There seems to only be one line explaining the impacts the economy has undergone from climate change. This is very relevant since the economy is the basis of the United States and should be elaborated further on. Salmaismail222 (talk) 01:16, 21 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Under "International cooperation" it would make sense to add climate change policies not only that the United states are enforcing but also what other countries are putting in place for their own climate regulations and see if the U.S. could learn anything from these policies. Milkncooki (talk) 17:44, 23 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Also within the "International Cooperation" section of your article, you could utilize how new electric cars and renewable energy sources are becoming more available leading people across the world to producing less carbon emissions throughout the world. Milkncooki (talk) 17:53, 23 April 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Sorry there won't be any Teslas left for you Americans as new PM Albanese will ship them all down under. Chidgk1 (talk) 15:34, 29 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Trade embodied emissions[edit]

"the EU, the U.S., and Japan are the largest net recipients of trade-embodied carbon dioxide emissions." In other words countries export pollution (and climate change) though the importing of goods. 

https://news.mit.edu/2014/calculating-chinas-carbon-emissions-from-trade

I would like to add this to the entry but don't know where?

Please suggest or help Flibbertigibbets (talk) 01:21, 20 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Wiki Education assignment: College Composition II[edit]

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 16 January 2024 and 11 May 2024. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Oliviahowe07 (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by Lindseybean28 (talk) 21:25, 9 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Volume of content re insurance[edit]

@CommonKnowledgeCreator: Your recent edits add about 33% to an article that is already long. Much of your content is incredibly detailed and of short-term interest, especially the year-by-year, and even quarter-by-quarter statistics. I don't have the link, but there is a Wikipedia guideline that we should include content only if it will be notable for readers in ten or twenty years. If you want to persist in anything close to this level of detail, probably it's best to start an article like Insurance and climate change in the United States, and leave only a very concise summary here. —RCraig09 (talk) 21:34, 20 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Well, after looking for academic research using Google Scholar and looking for news content to create the subsection for several months now, I don't know how much more content there really would be to add to the subsection because this is basically all I found that identifies a clear relationship between climate change and insurance in the United States. However, how climate change is impacting the provision of insurance in the United States is one of the main ways in which it is impacting the U.S. economy, so I'd argue that detailed coverage is justifiable. I acknowledge that the annual statistics will become outdated in time, but the statistics cited are fairly recent and until there are secondary sources that cover long-term impacts of climate change on the provision of various categories of insurance (e.g. reports from financial regulatory agencies or journal article by professional economists who study the insurance sector in the United States specifically), I am not aware of lot of reliable sources for it.
As for your concerns about the length of the subsection, I think that's more defensible since the subsection is 22 kb of readable prose out of an 86 kb readable prose article. The subsection lede could be easily just excerpted in this article after a split. However, I'd just add as side-note that I've raised complaints about other articles (e.g. the Facebook article is 99 kb of readable prose) and my complaints have largely gone unheeded, and that the WP:SIZE and WP:SPLIT policy articles appear to have been changed. -- CommonKnowledgeCreator (talk) 21:57, 20 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
— @CommonKnowledgeCreator: I agree that climate change's effect on insurance is notable—notable enough for an independent article (maybe Effect of climate change on insurance). But notability of a topic does not imply that "detailed" coverage is "justifiable".
— Insurance should not occupy 25% of this article, which is about climate change per se and not insurance per se. Look at the Table of Contents and compare insurance to all the other topics and subtopics. Climate change may be important for insurance, but insurance is not as important a subtopic for climate change.
— You seem to imply you've included "basically all (you) found that identifies a clear relationship between climate change and insurance in the US". We simply can't include "all" that we "find". See WP:SIZERULE and WP:NOTNEWS and, especially, WP:UNDUE.
— You are condemning other editors to cleaning up outdated, short-term micro-statistics in the future. (This clean-up would be required, even if you break out a sub-article, but especially heere.) I'd rather not bother other editors with a formal WP:Request for comment, and I think if you stand back and look at this article objectively as a whole, you'd see your recent addition is an extreme outlier. —RCraig09 (talk) 17:05, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I've already acknowledged that the subsection's length would justify a split and would not have a problem with a split. My only complaint is that when I've raised the same issue with a different article, the policy has not been enforced. You've gone a lot further in your complaints about my contribution than is necessary to get across your concerns, and the tone of the language you've used to describe my contribution is more than a little uncharitable. It's a topic I myself will continue to follow in the news, so as long as I continue to contribute to Wikipedia, it will be updated. However, I think your application of the WP:NOTNEWS and WP:UNDUE policies here is largely conditional on the assumption that insurance is not a sufficiently important sub-topic of climate change even though you acknowledge that it is a notable topic. The subsection is not original reporting about a breaking news topic and does not feature coverage of routine announcements, but descriptions of market pricing trends over time. However, if you still feel that this too much detail, then I'd reiterate what I said in my initial comment: the subsection lede can simply be excerpted on this article following a split. -- CommonKnowledgeCreator (talk) 17:57, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry you viewed my remarks as uncharitable. (I couldn't quite follow which side of the issue where you were on, when you said you raised complaints elsewhere.) I agree it would be a good idea to transclude or duplicate a brief intro to a separate sub-article. —RCraig09 (talk) 18:59, 21 May 2024 (UTC)[reply]
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