By “alarmist”, I meant making dire predictions, not sounding panicked when they do
If you don’t mind, I would like to probe your usage of this term...
What distinction do you draw between “alarmist” and “alarming”?
If the hypothetical situation is such that the truth really is properly dire, are accurate reports of this dire truth best classified as “alarmist”?
How should you react when, one night in the laboratory, you make an alarming discovery with fairly high confidence? After having them independently verified, would you consider yourself an “alarmist” for reporting your own findings?
Maybe I should have avoided the term “alarmist” in that context, since it often implies unjustified predictions of danger, which I obviously did not mean to imply. I’m not interested in arguing over definitions.
Good, I just wanted to be clear. In my experience that “alarmist” usually does strongly imply that the predictions of danger are unjustified, and that interpretation (which I presume most readers default to) risks changing the intended meaning of your statement that “climate scientists[...] are often quite alarmist.”
Now that I re-read your top-level post knowing what you meant, I think I understand much better what you are saying.
If you don’t mind, I would like to probe your usage of this term...
What distinction do you draw between “alarmist” and “alarming”?
If the hypothetical situation is such that the truth really is properly dire, are accurate reports of this dire truth best classified as “alarmist”?
How should you react when, one night in the laboratory, you make an alarming discovery with fairly high confidence? After having them independently verified, would you consider yourself an “alarmist” for reporting your own findings?
Maybe I should have avoided the term “alarmist” in that context, since it often implies unjustified predictions of danger, which I obviously did not mean to imply. I’m not interested in arguing over definitions.
Good, I just wanted to be clear. In my experience that “alarmist” usually does strongly imply that the predictions of danger are unjustified, and that interpretation (which I presume most readers default to) risks changing the intended meaning of your statement that “climate scientists[...] are often quite alarmist.”
Now that I re-read your top-level post knowing what you meant, I think I understand much better what you are saying.